By ROBERT HIRTLE

 Brenda Rooney and her husband, Robert, are a couple of Quebec-based, professional filmmakers who are using their expertise in a unique and heartwarming way.

 Back in 2002, the Rooneys produced a narrative film outlining the effects of the HIV/AIDs pandemic in southern Africa entitled "Condoms, Fish & Circus Tricks," which eventually was shown at the local United church in their hometown of Wakefield, Quebec, as a fundraiser.

 Several months later, thanks to an audience member whose mother had spent a year working at a clinic in Alexandra Township in South Africa, the church received another visit, this one from Rose Letwaba, a psychiatric nurse who worked at the same clinic.

 Ms Letwaba related a story about a group of 40 grandmothers in the village who were left the task of raising their grandchildren after nearly an entire generation, their children, were virtually wiped out by the AIDS virus.

 The grandmothers, who became affectionately known as the Alexandra Grannies, or Gogos in their native tongue, met regularly at the clinic for sewing classes, gardening and to give each other moral support.

 The morning after Ms Letwaba's presentation, congregation member Norma Geggie suggested that a dozen grandmothers from the church join together to support their counterparts in South Africa, and the Wakefield Grannies were born.

 "What happened was, my husband ... asked Norma Geggie, who is an historian, if he could film [us] and she said yes," Ms Rooney recalled. "So we met, a fait accompli, at our first meeting, and Robert filmed the Grannies and everything we did for the first three years. And we went to South Africa and filmed the Gogos we were supporting and their lives."

Filmmakers Brenda and Robert Rooney flank South African "Gogos" Magdeline Ramakobo and Caslina Mkustshutwa as they walk home with their grandchildren.

 The result was a film entitled "The Great Granny Revolution," a documentary-style production that describes the Wakefield Grannies, "how they got going, the women they were supporting and what their lives are like."

 It also portrays the story of how the Wakefield Grannies, Ms Letwaba and three other Gogos from Alexandra Township were brought together in 2006 at the Toronto conference which officially launched the Stephen Lewis Foundation's Grandmothers to Grandmothers campaign, an initiative which spearheaded support of African grandmothers and AIDS-orphaned children nationwide.

 Ms Rooney says while there is quite a bit of sadness and many heartbreaking stories are related in the film, "there is also a lot of humour. It's really a film about older women and older women are really funny." In the year and a half since the Lewis Foundation conference, over 200 Granny groups have sprung up across Canada and more are on the way.

 Ms Rooney said she believes that movement has been caused by something that is happening demographically in our society, the result of the current grandmother generation being the first to have open access to birth control.

 "We, therefore, had the choice to have families, to have education, to have careers, to have everything," she explained. "We are now getting ready to retire. We have skills, expertise and our health, and we're going to do something with it."

 The Rooneys are in the process of taking "The Great Granny Revolution" on a cross-country tour, with one of their stops being a showing at Lunenburg's Pearl Theatre, November 5 at 7 p.m.

 On hand will be members of the local chapter of Grandmothers to Grandmothers, which was formed in 2006 and has been actively raising funds to assist their African counterparts ever since.

 "The film is inspiring. So as soon as it is over, everyone wants to get involved and they feel so energized. So it's good to have the local Granny group there for people to go and talk to and find out what's going on," Ms Rooney said, adding there will also be a question-and-answer period held following the presentation.