multi-screen projection 2014 – 2015

Twenty years ago I began a six-year process of making a non-linear experimental narrative video called The Water’s Tale, an experimental feminist fairy tale. To mark the 20-year anniversary, I revisited the imagery and created a multi-screen video project piece. Haunting imagery of a woman submerged in the ocean, holding an open hynm book. Her freeing transformation unfolds to the music of Nova Scotia composer Sandy Moore.

One version was screened at Nocturne Halifax 2014.

The Water’s Tale

Nova Scotia 1996

46 min. 1996
written, directed, produced by Ann Verrall
associate producers: Barbara Badessi, Chuck Clark

award winning experimental feminist fairy tale, shot on Hi-8 video and edited before the digital revolution.

At the edge of the world a Child learns from her Grandmother that she is descended from the fairies. She longs to know more but her Grandmother is silent. To find the story of her past, the Child enter the land of The In-between and travels to the beginning of time when Fairies roamed the earth. But the story she finds is not the one she wants. In a fit of anger she sends her Grandmother down into the sea to find the magic story she wishes for. Filled with remorse, she plunges into the sea to bring her back. As the Child sinks, the sleeping world of fairies begins to stir and the long lost secrets are awakened. The Water’s Tale is a story of the interconnection between a woman and the past – herself as a child and the burden of history through the ages.

New York Exposition of Short Film & Video: Special Jury Award
Worldfest, Houston Texas: Experimental Drama Bronze Award
Atlantic Film Festival
- Margaret Perry Award for best Produced Film: Ann Verrall
- Best Editing: Ann Verrall
- Best Cinematography: Chuck Clark

Of the many stories fairies tell
This you must remember well
It is a tale of those who’ve died
Beneath the swirling, rushing tide
And of others who were doomed
As smoke engulfed and flames consumed
And if you think this is their fate
The fairies know it’s not too late
For deep within the rumbling sea
There’s magic that can set them free.