Thunder Bay's Tony McGuire wades through the conflict and contradiction of Far North development
When Thunder Bay and Anishinaabe filmmaker Tony McGuire embarked upon a documentary project on the proposed roads to the Ring of Fire, he admittedly struggled with finding a focus.McGuire had been invited by the isolated communities of Marten Falls and Webequie First Nations to take on a lightning rod of a topic among Indigenous people, environmental groups, politicians and industry for the last 15 years.
The documentary is told from the point of view of Marten Falls and Webequie and their combined effort to bring permanent roads to the isolated communities for the first time. It was filmed amidst the backdrop of the pandemic and highlights the chronic on-reserve issues of suicide, food security, and the overall impoverished standard of living.
He choose to tell a “fuller story,” starting at the early mineral discovery phase and progressing to today’s environmental assessment stage. There’s was “so much” material to comb through. Bridges to the North was filmed during the height of the pandemic when the remote fly-in communities were on lockdown.
Elders see the community drug problems and young people dying, McGuire said, and opine that development is necessary for the well-being of future generations to survive and thrive.
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