CaribbeanTales Youth Film Festival

The son of Barbadian parents, Cabral Trotman was born in Toronto Canada. After his parents divorced, his mom moved him to Barbados where he spent many of his early years, before returning to his home town Rexdale, in the west end of Toronto.

Cabral first became interested in filmmaking at West Humber Collegiate during a grade eleven English Media class. It is during that English class that Cabral started to understand Media literacy and the importance of having a voice. It was that spark that ignited
Cabral’s interest in becoming a Filmmaker which evolved to a responsibility to share stories and perspectives that are relevant to his community. That revelation spawned the birth of Skylarc a name Cabral adopted as his own once he made his commitment to Film. When asked about the interpretation of his name he responded ” The Skylark is known to originate from Africa, migrating to north america, hovering higher than all other song birds and singing the longest most versatile song”, his persona as a artist from lyricist to filmmaker began to take flight.
Skylarc or LARC as he’s known to by most, spent the next two years 1995-1997, volunteering as a Production Assistant for the pioneer music video company RAJE Film
House, which proved to be a fertile learning ground for his development in that art form. The RAJE Film House alumni include: Jeremy Hood, Alison Duke, Ricardo Diaz and
Little X to name a few and were responsible for creating a start for many prominent Blacks in all facets of the film industry in Toronto. Larc was able to soak in the full
experience of being a Production Assistant with RAJE and work hands on creating the first videos for “Urban” recording artists like Nelly Furtado and K-OS. Soon after those experiences Larc was then given the opportunity to direct his first music video in 1998 for rappers D-sisive & Abdominal.

Larc then attended the 3-Year Film & Television program at Humber College. His first film was a short entitled “Dramacidal” which told the story of a young black youth,
living in a low-income high-risk neighborhood in Rexdale known as “Doomstown. Considered a first film of it’s kind at the time, the film spoke to the conditions and
circumstances faced by a young black youth growing up in the hood.

Larc wanted to learn more about the commercial industry and it’s approach to filmmaking so after graduating in 2000 he gained experience as a TAD and Camera Trainee, using both experiences more as learning opportunities to further his education in his chosen discipline as a filmmaker.

After shadowing Malcolm Lee, cousin of famed director Spike Lee for three months on the film Undercover Brother, LARC finally emerged as a self-proclaimed filmmaker, truly understanding the execution of the art form for the first time in that capacity. He then joined the director roster at Dante Entertainment where he made the Toronto
underground classic “Where I’m From” for recording artist Black-I. The music video “Where I’m From” for the first time spoke of the many ills experienced by hoods across
the city and is still considered one of the strongest conceptualizations in Toronto rap music videos to date.

Shortly after his tenure at Dante Entertainment, LARC lost his older brother to a horribleact of violence in front of their apartment building in Rexdale. He then decided that it
was critical to play a small role in creating safe spaces where young people could acquire skills while discovering positive outlets of expression.

He started by designing and facilitating filmmaking workshops in low-income inner-city communities. He noticed that during visualization exercises where participants were
asked to create storyboards 90% of the time the storyboards would depict drive-by shootings or revenge plots. He found success when he flipped the script and started
themed workshops on the environment, community pride, racism, and knowledge of self.
Having worked with a number of youth in various public housing communities over the past several years he began to link many of the current issues in TCHC communities
(public housing) to a lack of leadership in the community, systemic structural constraints and barriers for youth in radicalized neighborhoods coupled with a real lack of
ancestral values and connections. He was then approached by the Community Safety Secretariat, City of Toronto, to direct The Survivors Project: Voices from the Insideout!,
a film that looks at the impact of gun violence on mental heath amongst young black youth in Toronto.

LARC is currently a Technical Officer for the Film Unit and Arts Educator at the Errol Barrow Centre for Creative Imagination, University of the West Indies, Cave Hill
Campus, Barbados, where he plays an integral role in the development of films and filmmakers through the BFA Creative Arts program. He’s currently in production of his
first Bajan drama “Back Shots” with aims to set a bench mark for Barbadian dramatic storytelling