TOURIST BOARD WELCOMES 'TITANS' RELEASE AS BOON FOR TENERIFE

SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Monday March 29 2010

TENERIFE'S tourism chief predicted that Hollywood blockbuster Clash of the Titans would boost tourism in the island on Monday.

by JAMES TWEEDIE

Cabildo government tourism minister José Manuel Bermúdez said that the 3D epic, which was partly filmed in Tenerife's Mount Teide national park and at the Los Gigantes cliffs, would draw much-needed tourists to the recession-hit island.

Speaking at a press conference at the Tenerife Arts Space (TEA) in the capital Santa Cruz, Mr Bermúdez said that the tourist board's public relations firm in London would make the most of the film's worldwide release next month to promote the island, pointing out that the Harry Potterfilms had made London a more popular tourist destination.

He insisted that the film's setting was not a matter of chance, but of hard work by his department which invited location manager Robin Higgs to the island to scout out the scenery.

Mr Bermudez added that the forthcoming final episode of the sixth series of TV drama Lost – the highest-rated programme ever – features a flashback to Tenerife in 1867, although the scene was filmed in Hawaii.

Journalists were shown a trailer for the movie cut with interviews with the cast and crew.

Director Louis Leterrier was shown saying: “Unlike locations I’ve seen many times in movies, this was brand new, with black and white lava, and green trees, and strange cloud formations.

“It felt like we were above the world, in a place that hadn’t been touched by human hands.”

Production designer Martin Laing added: “We could have gone to New Zealand, but Tenerife has a wonderful light and flavour.”

Recalling his first view of the famous cliffs at Los Gigantes on the west coast, producer Kevin De La Noy said: “There was nothing quite as gratifying as my first trip down there, looking up to the heavens where these great vertical cliffs rose 300 or 400 metres out of the water.”

The latest telling of the ancient Greek legend of Perseus and Andromeda references the 1981 classic of the same name, starring Lawrence Olivier alongside stop-motion animator Ray Harryhausen's fantastical creatures.

Harryhausen also created the dinosaurs and other monsters for the Hammer production One Million Years B.C. – possibly the most famous film ever shot in Tenerife.

The new Clash of the Titans features Avatar star Sam Worthington (pictured) as Perseus, Alexa Davalos as Andromeda, Liam Neeson as Zeus, king of the gods, and Ralph Fiennes as Hades, god of the underworld.

The film will premier in Tenerife on Tuesday March 30 at 9pm at the Santa Cruz' Yelmo cinema.

The mystery of the Guanches

The origins and language of the indigenous people of the Canary Islands remain a mystery, writes Dr Sabina Goralski Filonov Translation by James Tweedie The guanches, the aboriginals of the Canary Islands whose origin, lost in the mists of time, still arouses intense and passionate debate and great controversy about their origins and the how the seven Canary Islands were populated – which according to some studies occurred between 10,000 and 8,000 years BC. Literally, the word ‘Guan’ means man or person and ‘Chenech’ or ‘Chinet’ is applied to the island of Tenerife, thus meaning a man or inhabitant of Tenerife – although according to Núñez de la Peña, the Spanish named them the Guanchos during the conquest of the islands. But with the passage of time, experts in the subject are questioning whether the word Guanche was used to designate the primitive inhabitants of all the islands in the pre-Hispanic period. The term ‘Guanche’ has also ceased to be applied to the distin

Los Gigantes Beach Landslide Tragedy - Three Days of Mourning for Victims

SHATTERED IDYLL: Los Guios beach in Los Gigantes in happier times. SANTIAGO del Teide council declared three days of official mourning after two women were killed in a landslide on Los Gigantes beach on November 1. by James Tweedie The local authority announced the period of mourning following an emergency council meeting on Monday November 2, called in response to the tragic deaths of 57-year old British holidaymaker Marion O’Hara and 34-year old Canarian hotel worker Maria Vanesa Arias Romera. Flags at Santiago del Teide town hall were flown at half mast for the period of mourning, and all official functions observed a minute’s silence in memory of the victims. The two women were killed when 130-foot wide stretch of the cliffs above the tiny Los Guios beach collapsed from a height of about 200 feet, burying them beneath rubble up to 15 feet deep, according to a spokesman for the Guardia Civil which was conducting the investigation into the accident. The landslide occurred about 3pm

Dispossessed Couple Begin Hunger Strike

SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Wednesday August 18 2010 A CANARIAN couple began an “indefinite” hunger strike outside Tenerife's Palace of Justice on Wednesday in a property dispute. by JAMES TWEEDIE Husband and wife José María Fernández Herrero and Esmerelda Delgado (pictured) from the island of El Hierro are protesting against a court ruling in March which deprived them of 350 square metres of the land on which their home is built. The couple set up camp outside the court building on in Avenida Tres de Mayo in the provincial capital with nothing but sleeping bags, folding chairs and a banner on Tuesday August 17. They announced their hunger strike, during which they will eat nothing and drink only water, at a press conference the next day. Their banner read: “Against judicial defenselessness in El Hierro.” The couple accuse lawyer Reyes Margarita Fernández Qunitero – a substitute judge who has nevertheless been in office for over four years, and who presided over the court case – of ru

African Teachers Against Privatisation

Teachers from across Africa urged the continental bloc to halt the privatisation of national education systems today. Unions affiliated to the Education International (EI) federation pressed the African Union (AU) to stop the spread of sordid tin-shack schools funded by the world's richest man. The EI statement, issued in the Ethiopian capital and seat of the AU Addis Ababa warned: “we are witnessing a shift away from education as a public good,” with “a reduction in education budgets and increased privatisation of education.” “This is not the Africa we want,” said EI Africa Committee Chair Christian Addai-Poku, referring to the AU's 'Agenda 2063' plan. “Quality education for the public good is an indispensable condition for the development of our continent and the realisation of the full potential of all its people.” The teaching unions criticised the rapid growth across the continent of ‘low-cost’ private schools, which they said were “notorious for empl

UNIONS UNITE FOR GENERAL STRIKE

SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Tuesday June 8 2010 EXCEPTIONAL trade union unity failed to ensure a big turnout in Tenerife for Tuesday's strike against public sector pay cuts. by JAMES TWEEDIE In a rare display of non-sectarian coordination, members of more than ten trade union federations took part in the general strike across public services. They included the big national CCOO and UGT, the smaller anarchist CNT and CGT, the CSIF and ANPE, and regional federations Intersindical Canaria, FSOC, SEPCA, EA-Canarias and INSUCAN. Police and judicial unions CEP, SUP, UFP and STAJ also joined the strike, which was supported by political parties such as the United Left (IU), social movement umbrella group Assembly for Tenerife (AXT) and pro-public health service campaigners ADSPC. The dispute is over plans by the Socialist Workers Party of Spain (PSOE) government of prime minister José Luis Zapatero to cut public sector wages and pension rights in response to the economic crisis. Despite the i

Search This Blog