Doc about RCMP shooting reveals larger issues
Mental-health supports lacking across Canada
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Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 24/01/2024 (925 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
Ian Daffern wishes his latest documentary wasn’t a true story.
He’s undoubtedly proud of the work, but it only exists because four years ago when a British Columbia man named Barry Shantz needed mental-health support, an army of police showed up at his doorstep instead.
Not a single mental health worker responded to the call, and Shantz, 63, was shot and killed by a member of the RCMP.
SUPPLIED A Bullet Pulling Thread - documentary Marilyn Farquhar, sister of Barry Shantz, 63, who was shot and killed by a member of the RCMP in BC four years ago, makes grief quilts called kairos to keep her brother’s story alive and apply pressure on the government to press charges and change policy.
Movie preview
A Bullet Pulling Thread
- Dave Barber Cinematheque, 7 p.m.
- Admission $6-$10
If Shantz’s name sounds familiar, it might be because of Abbotsford v. Shantz, the 2015 B.C. Supreme Court case that put the longtime activist at the heart of one of the country’s most consequential decisions for homeless rights. The decision in that case found Abbotsford’s ban on temporary shelters in public spaces unconstitutional — an unprecedented ruling in Canadian housing rights.
Daffern, a Toronto filmmaker, heard about Shantz’s death, for which no charges have yet been laid, through a colleague who knew Shantz’s sister, Marilyn Farquhar.
Soon after, Daffern called Farquhar to ask her blessing in making a film about her brother.
A Bullet Pulling Thread plays tonight at 7 p.m. at the Dave Barber Cinematheque as part of the theatre’s Human Rights Through Film series, sponsored by the Canadian Museum for Human Rights.
SUPPLIED A Bullet Pulling Thread - documentary Marilyn Farquhar, sister of Barry Shantz, 63, who was shot and killed by a member of the RCMP in BC four years ago.
SUPPLIED
Marilyn Farquhar is the sister of Shantz.
Farquhar told Daffern she was making grief quilts called kairos to keep her brother’s story alive and apply pressure on the government to press charges and change policy. Farquhar agreed to meet Daffern, who went to her home to capture footage of the quilts as they were being made.
“Before I even had funding, I was sending camera people to her house to film the final moments of the film’s creation,” Daffern says. That early footage paved the way for Daffern to get funding through the Canada Council for the Arts for a feature-length documentary.
What Daffern discovered, through conversations with colleagues and friends, was that Shantz led an extraordinary life.
At 18 years old, he left his hometown of Kitchener, Ont., to become a drug smuggler in British Columbia. After spending time in prison, he became an outspoken and respected advocate for the homeless and people experiencing mental illness and addiction, boldly reaching out to politicians and anyone who would listen about the mistreatment he witnessed in Abbotsford and the surrounding area.
“You watch this person go on an incredible journey,” Daffern says.
SUPPLIED A Bullet Pulling Thread - documentary Marilyn Farquhar, sister of Barry Shantz, 63, who was shot and killed by a member of the RCMP in BC four years ago, makes grief quilts called kairos to keep her brother’s story alive and apply pressure on the government to press charges and change policy.
SUPPLIED
Farquhar, makes grief quilts to keep her brother’s story alive.
But Daffern says that as much as his film tells the story of Shantz’s life, it documents the after-effects of the RCMP’s arrival at his doorstep in January 2020 and the mission his sister took to create social change through her art.
Aside from interviews with Farquhar and archival footage of Shantz on the frontlines, Daffern’s film features an interview with the director of the Independent Investigations Office of BC, the civilian-led police oversight agency akin to Manitoba’s Independent Investigation Unit.
“I got to hold his feet to the fire, asking him the questions Marilyn and Barry’s lawyers were asking,” says Daffern.
A Bullet Pulling Thread will be showing at Yukon’s Available Light Festival in February, and Daffern hopes it will be screened elsewhere across the country.
“Because every city and every town has a story like this,” he says.
SUPPLIED A Bullet Pulling Thread - documentary Marcie Good - the journalist who tells Barry’s story in the film. Barry Shantz, 63, was shot and killed by a member of the RCMP in BC four years ago.
ben.waldman@winnipegfreepress.com
Ben Waldman is a National Newspaper Award-nominated reporter on the Arts & Life desk at the Free Press. Born and raised in Winnipeg, Ben completed three internships with the Free Press while earning his degree at Ryerson University’s (now Toronto Metropolitan University’s) School of Journalism before joining the newsroom full-time in 2019. Read more about Ben.
Every piece of reporting Ben produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.
Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber.
Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.
Ben Waldman is a National Newspaper Award-nominated reporter on the Arts & Life desk at the Free Press. Born and raised in Winnipeg, Ben completed three internships with the Free Press while earning his degree at Ryerson University’s (now Toronto Metropolitan University’s) School of Journalism before joining the newsroom full-time in 2019. Read more about Ben.
Every piece of reporting Ben produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.
Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber.
Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.
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Updated on Wednesday, January 24, 2024 8:20 AM CST: Fixes headline
