Transcript
Speaker: I'm Jane Williams. This is the Red Eye Podcast. You can hear our live broadcast on Saturday mornings from 10 till noon at 100.5 FM in the Lower Mainland.
Speaker: On the podcast today, we talk with Director Christopher Ochter about how the Haider took a stand on Lyle Island. in 1985. Okta's documentary, The Stand, has several screenings in Vancouver this month.
Speaker: Stay tuned at the end of the podcast for more information about how to see this film. On a misty morning in the fall of 1985, a small group of Haida people blockaded a muddy dirt road on Lyle Island, demanding that the government work with indigenous people to find a way to protect the land and the future.
Speaker: The Stand is a riveting new feature documentary drawn from more than 100 hours of archival footage from that first blockade and the months that followed.
Speaker: Christopher Octor, director of the award-winning documentary Now Is The Time, recreates the critical moment when the Haida Nation took a stand to protect their land.
Speaker: Christopher Octor joins me this morning from Burnaby. Hello, Christopher. Hello. Good morning. Let's start with situating where that happened. Where is Lyle Island and what was happening there that fall?
Speaker: Yeah, so Lyle Island is located on Haida Gwaii, in the south islands of Haida Gwaii. And Haida Gwaii is cluster of islands located off of British Columbia.
Speaker: And this is where all the action was happening in 1985 in terms of the Haida making their stand to stop the logging that was going on down there. the Landslides were happening.
Speaker: The Haida had been talking with the British Columbia government in Canada to stop the logging in this area because the Haida wanted to protect that area. And it was looking good for a little bit.
Speaker: They were getting some nice talk from the BC government and they were delaying the new TFL license to the logging companies in the area, Frank Bedman Logging Western Forest Products.
Speaker: And then all of a sudden, BC greenlights the new TFL license, a new fresh landslide as well in the area. And the Haida said that's enough. And they went to the island and blockaded.
Speaker: The film begins as a blockade has already started and there's a helicopter flying over a road where think about 15 people are standing. What led up to that moment, to that tactic? What discussions among the Haida?
Speaker: Yeah, well, it was really what the Haida felt is it was their last resort because they tried talking. They tried to get it done in that manner without being disruptive to families and to people that were working in the area.
Speaker: But... It was just going on deaf ears and they would get promises and then, you know, they turn their back and make another promise to somebody else in terms of issuing fresh new TFL licenses for cutting permits in South Moresby.
Speaker: So the Haida felt just after so long, like ah literally since contact and since... The smallpox wiped out the large number of our population, residential schools, all that, really.
Speaker: The Haida said enough was enough, and they felt strong enough to stand up for ourselves again, and had a presence down there to say, there'll be no more logging here, so says the Haida Nation.
Speaker: And that shocked a lot of people. And they took a ah non-violent route. I mean, they just stood in the road and said, no, we're here. Yeah, yeah. And that was the really the key strategy.
Speaker: It was the the mantra, and you you couldn't step beyond that. And it was the strategy of the Haida to use that because they knew like if we tried force, if we tried taking over you know the the logging camp and stuff like that, then they'd be dealing with a much different Canada. There would be you know militarization and stuff like that, and the Haida can't really...
Speaker: stand up to a military force in that way. So so they brought the fight and then in the way that they knew that they could win, or at least the possibility was good that they could win through the means of the Western playbook, I guess, but you know like the courts and public opinion, all those things.
Speaker: So it was ah really quite an intelligent play on the part of the Haidas and a strategic one. Some elements of what we see on the screen are still happening today. They're very familiar to us now. There's the court-ordered injunctions, the RCMP going in and making arrests.
Speaker: But the nature of the interactions was so different from what happens today. You could even say that the exchanges were were friendly and respectful.
Speaker: Would you agree? Oh, totally. Yeah, it's such a stark contrast. And i think I think all sides need credit on that. Like the Haida had a calm, kind of collected nature about them.
Speaker: The loggers, for the most part, and the RCMP. Like I was talking with... He's the main officer in the film that that we see often. His name is um Harry Wallace.
Speaker: And I talked to him on the phone. And for his part, he said his first day that he arrived on Lyle Island, they went by boat. was a really kind of stormy, stormy day. But they went first to the Haida camp.
Speaker: And it was around lunchtime. And the Haida had halibut soup on. And the Haida gave him and his fellow officers some soup. And Harry said he just felt that like the soup was delicious.
Speaker: And so he asked for some more. And he said that he was greeted with big smiles and stuff, that he he liked the soup and he wanted more. So they gave him more and stuff. But he said that was just like, it seemed like the perfect way to start a difficult situation.
Speaker: you know, having this kind of this, this human moment, right, of sharing food and showing respect to each other. And that just carried on throughout. And because ah the the officers were staying in the Frank Bevan logging camp.
Speaker: But Harry Wallace said to me, like, he tried as much as he could to also go and visit the Haida camp as well. And You know, there were some moments where the RCMP were having coffee with the Haidas and just talking about things that were happening and what each other were hearing.
Speaker: So and the the lines of communication were just open wide. And I think that really made a huge difference in the outcome. And in terms of the amount of respect, everyone was showing each other.
Speaker: As I said in my introduction, you had almost 100 hours of archival footage to work with. Where did all that come from? yeah yeah. I really did have a wealth of ah footage and audio recordings. not Not everything that I gathered was you know directly related to Lyle Island because when I was trying to get a handle on the story and stuff, I felt I needed to understand as much as I could you know, what was going on in the time and, you know, the years before this moment, try to get an idea of the landscape and the sense of time.
Speaker: But a lot of the footage that we see in the film was filmed by a young filmmaker at the time. Her name was Susan Underwood and Donna Wilson, who, you were filmmakers here and in the Vancouver area.
Speaker: And they they heard what was happening in 1985 up on Haida Gwaii. And so they flew themselves up and... I'm not quite sure how, but they they kind of earned a relationship with the Haida. And Arnie Bellis was telling me that they were able to stay with the Haida and be at their camp, live with them at their camp on Lyle Island, beach just because of the type of people they were. like They weren't phony at all. They weren't overly trying. like They were just genuine people. And the Haida really...
Speaker: felt comfortable around them and and let them stay in the hide-a-camp with them. So we have all this this amazing footage that Susan and Donna captured, these just real human kind of Like the rehearsal moments. And so we'll we're we're we're getting these backstories and we're able to kind of see see these beautiful interactions between the height of and the more tense ones on the road because Susan and Donna were able to be there capturing it. and And then I was able to tell this story in the way that I did in terms of it all unfolding and in real time.
Speaker: We don't know what's going to happen next. Yeah, so a lot of it came from them. And it was quite a neat moment when I went to visit Susan, because that was the first thing I did after I let my uncle know who was a member of the Haida leadership and on Lyle Island. my My uncle Mike was there. So he said, I need to talk to Susan Underwood when I mentioned I'd love to tell this story.
Speaker: And So I went out to her home. It's out in the Langley area. And I went with my son. He was nine years old at the time. And COVID had just hit. And so we met outside on these park benches at her beautiful home.
Speaker: It's kind of in the woods and stuff like that. And we had this conversation. And she kind of asked what I was thinking for this film. And I was telling her. and then she went inside and she just kept bringing these boxes out they're full of these three quarter inch tape, beta tape, VHS.
Speaker: It filled my car, all these boxes of footage that she entrusted in me. And yeah the National Film Board digitized all this footage. And yeah, that was kind of the start of it. And then I got to work kind of reviewing it all and getting to see these amazing moments captured on film, amazingly powerful moments.
Speaker: It must have been overwhelming to decide what to use from all that footage. Oh, it certainly was. Yeah, it it it really was. And um I mean, certain scenes, certain moments did stand out. So, you know, those would be kind of anchor moments. But that was one of the the hardest things about making the film was where do we start?
Speaker: Where do we pull out? What do we include? Not to include. Our first edit, like my my editor was Sarah Hadar, who's the same editor that that I worked with for Now Is The Time.
Speaker: She's the same editor that did Edge of the Knife. And yeah our first edit of this film was four hours long. And we had to, you know... and And even then, I think that's pretty good when you when you're coming from over 100 hours of footage and and audio, like to get it down to four hours on our first crack, you know, but a lot of things. And we just slowly chipped away from there.
Speaker: um Yeah, so it was it was a real tricky task in terms of what to include and and whatnot. Yeah. Now, you included a few excerpts from the Webster show, and and including one where Miles Richardson and James Gosnell of the Nishka stood up to baiting, basically, by Jack Webster.
Speaker: What role did the Webster excerpts play in the film for you? Yeah, well, Jack Webster became ah very important character in the film.
Speaker: As combative as he was, it became critically important because it became like the voice of British Columbia and Canada. And he was asking really...
Speaker: tough questions and really coming after Miles Richardson, who is the president of the Haida Nation. When I seen that footage, it was it became quite clear to me that this really needs to be included as well. One, it's electric to watch.
Speaker: So I knew that that would stick well in the film. But he's also giving a lot of like through through the conversations and the debating that they're having. They're giving a lot of context and they're touching on a lot of points as to the why.
Speaker: Why are the Haida doing this now? What do the Haida want? Those things were critically important to me in terms of. Yeah, why why were the Haida there? What do the Haida want?
Speaker: And I didn't want to be the one to be explaining it in the way that I understood it. I wanted... the people that were there and living the moment to be the ones to explain it to the audience.
Speaker: Because I thought that was the best way to tell their story is by having them tell it themselves. And I'm telling and i'm letting them tell it themselves by showing them being there, having those intimate conversations around the fire as to why they're there. What do we want?
Speaker: What do we not want? And so Webster was a part of that because he was asking those tough questions that helped answer some of those really important points.
Speaker: And he also became, could be the voice of British Columbia in that he would let the public call into the program and give their opinion, ask a question to Miles and Gosnell as well, or even to Webster.
Speaker: And so that was a great way to kind of to capture the temperature in the room in terms of British Columbia and and what they were feeling about what was happening on Haida Gwaii, which at the time was called the Queen Charlotte Island. So even the use of the term Haida Gwaii was really a new thing that not a lot of people outside of the Haida community had heard, and even within the Haida community, I think. so So, yeah, there's there's a lot of things in this that might kind of slip under the radar, but were we're really new terminology that was coming out there for for everybody to go, oh, it's actually called Haida Gwai, not Queen Charlotte Islands.
Speaker: You chose not to use a narrator for the film. Why did you make that choice? The choice not to use a narrator came from how I wanted the the story to unfold. i really want I really thought it would kind of pull the audience in if they could take this story, say like a scripted drama or something like that.
Speaker: And the people in the film are are playing the roles of their lives. I just thought that would be compelling. um Aside from that, also, I had the difficult choices to try to make like, well, if I start interviewing,
Speaker: Who am I going to interview? And I'm going to leave someone out and that's not going to feel very good. And then also, doesn't matter who I interview, the story they tell is going to be tainted by the sand of time or the fog of time, however you want to say it. Like the that the story will go through all that experience that this person has experienced from 1985 to present day when I interview them.
Speaker: So it felt I would get it the clearest answers if i stick with what was said on the recordings and let the ones that were there um explain why they're there.
Speaker: And any kind of interviews that I included... it was like ah It was a rule for the film. like That person who's being interviewed by a reporter or something can't know what is happening the next day.
Speaker: like They have to be in that moment and at that point in the film that we are at, on that day, that's when they were interviewed. So not even Gujow knows what's going to happen come Wednesday, come tomorrow.
Speaker: So it keeps everything in in the present and everything that they know at that moment is what they're explaining to us as to the answers they're giving as to the why and what this means.
Speaker: I just felt that was the most honest way to tell the film. and the most relatable one, too. was such an interesting choice. And then I didn't even really realize that it was all just people's voices at the time until I was reflecting about what I was going to talk with you about today. And then realized, oh, yeah, most films, they go and talk to the people, like, you know, what, 40 years later. But this was just, it was just so gripping to watch it all unfold.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah. Well, thanks thanks for saying that. um the Yeah, and and then I felt the responses were just so super honest in in that way too. I'm going to refer to a moment in the film, just briefly.
Speaker: There's a moment where Teresa O'Leary speaks to Gujiao and she asked him about why did you choose to paint your faces? like What does that symbolize?
Speaker: And, you know, Gujo's answer, um he gave her an answer, but it was kind of a quick answer. And she said, well, explain it to me, like explain it further. I don't know. And Gujo took his time to think about it. He asked her, you know, please give me a moment. And then and then he explained it. And I just thought like, wow, like how gripping and honest a moment is, yeah because it's it's so easy when you're asked a question is to just...
Speaker: instantly jump into to trying to give the answer and but I just thought it was one a beautiful moment that Guja was was taking his time to really think about it and and search for the answer for the why that's for me felt so relatable and and made me kind of sit in waiting for his response but that was just an example I guess of one of those moments where uh it It spoke to the moment and it was interviewed on that day.
Speaker: So again, like Gujo didn't know what was going to be happening the next day. He didn't know if the police were going to come in, you know, the SWAC team was going to come in or something like that. Just or or what?
Speaker: and And that was the thing, like, there there was a ah real possibility and nobody knew kind of how, if this thing was going to turn violent like and how violent it would turn. So that was part of the tension I really wanted to try to hold with this film is we don't know which way it's going to go.
Speaker: So, yeah. I totally remember that moment. And I was actually, i was wondering whether or not to ask you about it. And I thought, oh, just, you know, I mean, you haven't given the answer, which is great, but it'll be something for people when they watch the film to, you know, listen for, because it really was a tremendous exchange they had there.
Speaker: Yes, yes. Yeah, totally. Now, this is the third film you've produced with Shirley Viacruzzi of the NFB. You worked together on Now Is The Time about the first new totem pole to be raised on Haida Gwai in 100 Years and and on another film.
Speaker: Tell me about your process of collaboration. Yeah, well, Shirley, she's my champion.
Speaker: I don't know if I'd be a director at all without her. She's really, ah i guess, that person that believes in me, which feels so good, right?
Speaker: For myself, it just feels so good to to have her. And she just gives me so much space to be able to make mistakes, but be creative, And, you know, doesn't shut down the ideas that might go a little too far.
Speaker: But I find that sweet spot within those those ideas. And i guess a really great example on this film, on the stand.
Speaker: is Sarah and I had just finished a new edit of the film, you know still quite a long film. and But we were really focusing on this particular version of the film was the opening, you know in terms of how are we going to grab the audience and make them interested enough to not change the channel or or just like fully forget about you know what's going on in the day.
Speaker: And so Shirley watched it. And her comment was later on, she said, well, you know, I'm I'm here, but I'm not here. And she was speaking specifically for the opening of the film. Like, I'm i'm sitting here, but I'm but i'm not here.
Speaker: And watching the film, but I'm not here. And that was that was all I needed to hear to kind of, I don't know, just a a creative light went off in my head and go, okay, that's the challenge.
Speaker: um I always knew it was a challenge, but for some reason when she said it like that, I was like, okay, like I really have to... Figure out a way to grab you and make you forget that you need to water that plant over there or that you have to pay this bill or something like that. Like just grab you and pull you in.
Speaker: So I wrote kind of the the opening dialogue for the film. It was kind of one of the few kind of scripted moments in the film. And I wrote that moment. And then I asked Sarah if she could build scenes like this.
Speaker: And this is what's going on. This is what's happening. Like there's something going on in the forest there. And the animals, the wildlife in the the ocean and on the land are reacting like something eerie and spooky is going on in there that's disturbing everything.
Speaker: And yeah, she she pulled together all these beautiful scenes of of sea lions and and river otters and stuff like that. And bears like all reacting. And it just kind of, it all came to that moment. And yeah, that that moment came because of this great comment, this great feedback that she gave me. And, you know, and just allowing for that space to be as creative as possible.
Speaker: I just, yeah, I love working with her. Well, it's a great film, and I told you before we started recording this interview that I actually couldn't stop watching it. I was a bit late for my supper because I couldn't pull myself away to go and cook.
Speaker: ah Amazing. That's the best thing I could hear. yeah Thank you. Thanks so much for talking with me today, Christopher. You take care as well, and I hope to talk to you again. Likewise.
Speaker: I spoke with Christopher Octor, writer and director of The Stand, in September last year. Last month, the federal government and the Haida Nation signed a historic agreement finally recognizing Aboriginal title over Haida Gwaii.
Speaker: The stand is showing here in Vancouver at the VIF Center on Howe Street tonight, at March 3rd, and also on the 6th, 10th, 13th, and 20th. You can buy tickets at vif.org.
Speaker: The film is produced and distributed by the National Film Board of Canada. If you can't make it to the Vancouver screenings, The Stand is going to be released online for free streaming across Canada on nfb.ca starting June 19th this year.
Speaker: You've been listening to the Red Eye Podcast, produced by an independent media collective based in Vancouver. If you enjoyed this episode, it would be great if you left a review on Apple Podcasts.
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Speaker: And you can follow us on Blue Sky at Red Eye Radio. I'm Jane Williams. Thanks for listening.
