NETTIE WILD TALKS DRUGS AND DRAMA

Grade A

Nettie Wild can remember the exact moment she decided to make a film about
Vancouver's infamously impoverished downtown Eastside. The documentary
filmmaker has been taking her powerful new film, Fix: The Story of an
Addicted City, on tour across the country for the past year and she sat
down for an interview with The Concordian earlier this week.

A few years ago, after her car was broken into and several thousand dollars
worth of research and equipment were stolen outside her editing studio on
the Eastside, Wild ran to the nearest dumpsters, hoping the thieves
discarded her things, after realizing they wouldn't lead to easy cash. In
"Blood Alley," as it is known to locals, she threw the lid off a dumpster
and came face-to-face with a resident of Canada's poorest neighborhood.

"I don't know who gave who the bigger heart attack. A man was shooting
up...into his groin, in the dumpster. We regarded each other for a moment.
I was horrified...not just that this guy in the dumpster was living the
life of a rat, but that [people like him] were everywhere...I was
appalled...I'd seen the face of degradation and it was frightening."

Soon after, she went to a meeting and heard an impassioned plea from a
woman named Ann Livingston, imploring city officials to create North
America's first safe injection site on the derelict strip of East Hastings
Street.

As any hapless tourist who has wandered too far east of picturesque Gastown
can tell you, Hastings is only steps away from the upscale downtown core
and within mere blocks of fancy shops and tree-lined streets. But it then
gives way to dilapidated buildings and arguably the most blatant glimpses
of human degradation in North America; the area that has a higher density
of drug addicts with HIV/Aids and Hepatitis C than anywhere else in Canada.

Livinston, a non-user, a single mother, an ardent spokesperson for drug
addicts and founder of the Vancouver Area Network for Drug Users, spoke
with conviction and the mood of D.I.Y. social activism that swept through
the room told Wild that there was, indeed, a film to be made.

After 18 months shooting on a $375,000 budget and after overcoming numerous
hurtles in gaining access to the police, the (now ex) Mayor Philip Owen, as
well as city council and local business owners in opposition to the
proposed "safe injection sites," Wild has emerged with a film that
addresses the issue from many sides and lends an ear to all parties, though
it gives the strongest voice to those who are not normally heard: the
addicts themselves.

The resulting film is intelligently shot and has a surprisingly compelling
narrative arch that revolves around Livingston; Dean Wilson, a former IBM
salesman, who is also a chronic drug user, an articulate advocate for safe
injection sites and Livinston's sometimes lover; and Owen, who is the
conservative but compassionate former mayor of the city. Thanks to these
completely captivating "enormous characters," Vancouver is now home to
North America's first safe injection site.

About her place in the realm of documentary, Wild said, "Our role of
storytellers is not that of politicians or healthcare workers or even
social activists...it is to tell the story as creatively and as
cinematically as possible...The most important thing for a documentary is
that it tells a story well and reveals human drama.

"Creating social change is not my main objective. I'm [here to] present
stories that need to get out." In the end, the main objective for Wild and
her production company is to make "the best damn films we can."

Fix is showing at CinEma du Parc Nov. 7 through 13 and Nettie Wild, Philip
Owen and Ann Livingston will be hosting discussions after the early evening
shows every day.