![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/Robert-in-Times-Square.jpg\")
<\/a>During his time on Haida Gwaii, Wilkinson met artist and photographer Robert Davidson for the first time; Davidson agreed to let Wilkinson use some of his stunning photography in his 2015 film Haida Gwaii: On the Edge of the World<\/i>. As time went on, Wilkinson noticed that a lot of the demonstrations he was attending against \u201cvarious pipelines and ill-conceived infrastructure projects\u201d were being led by Indigenous people. He looked around and noticed that Indigenous people were leading many\u2014if not most\u2014of the world\u2019s environmental battles.<\/p>\n
\u201cInterestingly enough, what we realized after some digging was that in 1969, Robert Davidson decided to carve a totem pole in Masset [a village on Haida Gwaii\u2019s coast] and it was the first pole that had been carved in over 100 years there,\u201d says Wilkinson. \u201cWhen Robert did that, there was this huge explosion of interest in North Coast culture and in Indigenous culture in general. Flash-forward to today, we\u2019re surrounded by it\u2014there\u2019s North Coast art everywhere and people have it on their T-shirts and they get tattoos. Not just Indigenous people\u2014you have people from every kind of background, so we started to realize the impact [that] North Coast art, North Coast culture, and, in particular, Robert Davidson\u2019s amazing work has had on non-Indigenous culture\u2014and that\u2019s the story of Haida Modern<\/i>, really.\u201d<\/p>\n
On the lighter side of things, local filmmaker Bryan Skinner has created a film about a film festival, and he\u2019s putting it in film festivals. Open for Submissions <\/i>was filmed in only eight days and has no pre-written dialogue; Skinner says that those constraints gave the film a \u201chandmade, real documentary feel to it.\u201d In other words, if you\u2019re a fan of The Office<\/i>, you\u2019re going to love Open for Submissions<\/i>.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s an improvised mockumentary about a film festival that loses its executive director in the closing gala, the awards presentation, of the previous year\u2019s film festival,\u201d says Skinner. \u201cSo two people go head to head\u2014the programmer and the operations manager for the festival\u2014and one of them gets [the executive director position], the operations manager, and then the programmer attempts to sabotage the festival by programming basically the worst of what comes in. I don\u2019t write any dialogue\u2014we talk about what has to happen in the scene, and then we talk about where the camera is going to move to, but I give no direction as to what is going to be said; it\u2019s just entirely an outline.\u201d<\/p>\n
This isn\u2019t Skinner\u2019s first mockumentary\u2014his 2008 film Tumbling After<\/i> used many of the same actors. Skinner says that knowing his actors\u2019 strengths and weaknesses really gave him the confidence he needed to pull off the tight filming schedule. But what is it that draws him to improvised comedy?<\/p>\n
\u201cWell, I like the energy that comes with working with really talented improvisers,\u201d he says. \u201cI grew up doing improvised theatre as a kid so to translate that to film, it just feels really vital and fresh. I just really enjoy the process of it. I also enjoy having fun on the set, and if I don\u2019t know what\u2019s gonna happen and what people are gonna say, that keeps it really fun for me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Skinner says that young filmmakers shouldn\u2019t feel limited by geographical location.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s advice that I should have heeded a long time ago, but I very much love Victoria, and most of the stuff that I do is about Victoria,\u201d he says. \u201cThat\u2019s probably not a great idea from a career perspective but that\u2019s just a personal thing for me. Also, it\u2019s the same advice for just about anything\u2014seek people out who are better than you and just acknowledge that, and then be willing to learn from them and steal their ideas.\u201d<\/p>\n