June 03, 2010
Bevel Up in Madras, India
By
Sarah Levine
I had a chance to catch up with Director Nettie Wild today about her recent lecture on Bevel Up to technology students in Madras, India. It was fascinating to think that the film we made about our work in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside was discussed and debated in such a different context. "The focus of my lecture was about how I worked in collaboration with the Street Nurses to figure out what the dramatic question would be." said Wild. "I realized my job was to film what non-judgement looked like".
So, she followed the nurses for several months as we did our jobs. This footage, which became the documentary portion of the DVD, opened up complex questions about nursing practice, ethics, policy, and culture. "We wanted to face the complexities, not avoid them. So that's how we came up with the form of the menu items, to go to the heart of these questions."
So how was all this received in Madras? Enthusiastically, apparently. Wild gave the lecture remotely from Surrey, BC to 200 students in India who had watched the film earlier in the day. Because of the time difference, she was giving the lecture at 9:00 pm Madras time. "I thought they'd all be tired, but there was so much discussion that they had to cut us off because we'd run out of time!" The issues weren't very different from those that come up when the film is screened in Canada. "One student asked if it wouldn't be better for the nurses to stop the drug use rather than teaching clients to inject. I didn’t have to answer because another student in the audience turned out to be a Harm Reduction All Star and stepped up to the plate, answering it much better than I could as they placed drug use in the local context." This student emphasised the need for the whole community to fight stigma and judgement. "She was clearly well-versed in the issues,' said Wild, "Bevel Up gave her a stepping stone to talk about them."
Students also wanted to know if Wild was ever surprised by what she saw during filming. "It wasn't the overt drug use that surprised me," said Wild. "It was that I had never filmed such intimate footage, so quickly after meeting people. But it's because of the relationship with the nurses - even a five-minute long relationship! Look at Lee in the film. The nurses had never met her before, but 5 minutes in, she was letting me film her while getting a needle in her bum, and putting the nurses on the phone with her boyfriend."
After the screening, Wild got an email from the organizer of the conference in Madras, saying Bevel Up was a hit, got phenomenal ratings, and that the University was proud to be involved. The contexts may change, but maybe the issues are the same, all over the world.
Tag(s):
Bevel Up,
Health/Health Advocacy,
Media Activism,
Technology,
Video
Recent Blogs by Sarah Levine:
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RN, Street Nurse & part of the Bevel Up outreach team.
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