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March 19, 2004
Rebuilding women's lives
Bridge raises awareness of inner-city housing needs.
JANNETTE EDMONDS SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH BULLETIN
It's not a slick Hollywood film headed for theatres, but it is
compelling in a hard-edged, transparent way – 22 minutes depicting
the struggle of some of Vancouver's Downtown Eastside women to rebuild
their mangled lives.
Building Bridge: A Housing Project for Women, which premièred
at the Vancouver Film Festival last year, is the brainchild of filmmaker
Jackie Levitin, associate professor in film and women's studies
at Simon Fraser University (SFU).
Levitin is a self-described feminist who "came of age during
the women's movement" and uses film as a form of activism,
a way to impact lives. She first became enchanted with film at 22
when she got a Super-8 movie camera. Before that, she was interested
in art and dance, and her first film was about dance, an abiding
love of hers. She is currently studying tango.
For Levitin, film is a chance to express all forms.
"Film allows you to do everything," she said. "It
allows you to explore ideas, if you are interested in ideas, rhythm,
because I love to dance, and art."
Levitin left a teaching position at Concordia University in Montreal
and moved to Vancouver and a job at SFU in 1989 to be close to her
mother in Seattle after her father died. She was born in Seattle
in 1945, and both her parents came there from Manchuria. The China
connection is leading Levitin on to her next project, exploring
her roots in a documentary about her family history and that of
the Jewish community in Harbin, China.
Filmmaking has allowed Levitin to do a lot of travelling, which
accounts for the impressive list of languages she speaks –
French, Spanish, Hebrew, Mandarin and Russian. And her topics have
included fascism, Salvadorian guerilla fighters, patients with schizophrenia,
rape and prostitution. Her work with women in the Downtown Eastside
is a natural extension of her twin teaching areas of women's studies
and film.
"People in the Downtown Eastside have been filmed to death,"
said Levitin. "All kinds of people are writing about them.
And they don't have the means to represent themselves, so in addition
to making this film I thought it would be good to teach a video
course so they could have the tools themselves."
The result was an eight-week video production workshop. She has
also taught drama workshops in Nicaragua, acting workshops with
former psychiatric patients and worked on dozens of film, video
and radio productions. She may be a soft-spoken woman, but her curriculum
vitae is 10 pages long.
Levitin's education took her to Washington, Paris at the Sorbonne,
and the State University of New York at Buffalo, where she received
her PhD. She has just joined the board of the Jewish Film Festival
and enjoys occasional visits to Or Shalom.
"Where I tend to make most of my films is in the social activist
realm. Films about ideas. Making people think about things,"
she said.
Her recent film definitely makes people think about things. Building
Bridge has helped raise awareness of inner-city women's housing
needs. The film traces the impact of a development project on women
who, from desperate straits, found a safe haven when Bridge Housing
for Women opened its doors in 2001. It was the result of a 20-year
effort by street people and activists to create a place of support
for 43 women to come off drugs and alcohol. In contrast to so much
of what is shown about life in this area – hopelessness, addiction,
prostitution, abuse and possible death – Levitin's film offers
a look at something positive being done.
Levitin directed, produced and filmed Building Bridge. She
hopes that it will show in more festivals and that more people will
become interested in making a positive contribution to the lives
of women in their inner cities. Levitin certainly has in hers.
Jannette Edmonds is a Vancouver freelance writer.
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