Monday, March 30, 2009

Snow Go



We’re snowed in. The car is hemmed in by drifts and the highways are closed. We venture out on foot, past huge trucks waiting with their engines on, to the Frontier Travel Centre for breakfast.

A microwaved chicken sandwich and a conversation with the staff later and we realise we’re not going anywhere today so we head back to the motel to catch up with logging, make some kit orders, and spend the day indoors.

At lunchtime we return to the Frontier. Josh asks whether they have any vegetables and gets a blank look. “Nope” (pause) “Everything is breaded”. He goes for an order of deep fried breaded green beans, and then individually de-batters them.

Today’s beer: Moose Drool (from the Big Sky Brewing Co.)

Angels



The alarm didn’t go off, so the day starts with a call from Richard saying he’s coming round to pick us up for Mass. It’s 7.22am and he’s going to be here at 7.30.

We drive round to the front at 7.38, feeling mildly pleased with ourselves. Josh rides to Sturgis with Richard so I take the opportunity to tuck in to the Girl Scout Cookies Josh got suckered in to buying yesterday outside Wal-Mart.

The church is already filling up for the 8.30 service when we arrive. Josh and Richard speak to the Father who is happy to let us film. We set up quietly at the back as he makes an announcement to the congregation who, to their credit, seem friendly and welcoming. Not many people between the ages of 10 and 50 I’d say. Unfortunately our position is next to someone with a mechanical breathing apparatus so it all gets a bit Blue Velvet for the first 5 minutes until we move.

The service zips along, some praying some singing some sermon some more praying. Everyone offers each other a sign of the peace. We smile a little awkwardly. Richard takes communion. Then we’re back out into the cold for a little one-on-one time between Richard and the boss man.

Next up is a visit to D’s. He’s clearly lived many lives. He and Richard spend time talking about the upcoming journey. He’s got some wisdom from 28 years of sobriety and a spell of serious hell raising before that. He and Richard cover interesting ground together and we film the session.

Lunch Special at Papa John’s in Wal-Mart then we get in some supplies for the trip we’ve got planned to meet Richard’s sister a “three hour” drive away up north.



We hit Highway 85 and the terrain opens out. Soon it’s just a straight road as far as the eye can see, and very little other traffic. It gets snowy on the road, then it starts to snow. It feels like we’re driving on clouds as the snow blows across the road like dry ice. Then visibility drops until we’re in a tunnel of white. That’s when we decide it’s probably wise to sit this one out.

We pull in to Bowman, North Dakota and find a place to stay. Dinner at Jabr’s Family restaurant, where Jenny the waitress has her brother and sister’s names tatooed on her wrists. She guesses we’re from New Zealand (?) and it’s not long until she has invited us for a “session” with her sister back at theirs. We explain we’re not musicians and politely decline for a night in with the beers at the Budget Host.



Choice of beer: Avalanche (obviously).



Saturday, March 28, 2009

First Impressions



After a slightly strange night’s sleep at the Foothills Inn I wake up at 5.30am and can’t turn my brain off so i skype and send emails and peer outside at the snowy tundra of Rapid City outskirts. 

At 8 i head over to Wal-Mart and wander round endless aisles of stuff. Nothing comes in small packages, so i buy a huge shampoo and a king-size toothpaste. As I choose the toothpaste there is a TV nearby blaring out a seemingly endless looping ad for Dogzilla chicken flavoured dog toys. Scary.

I leave Wal-Mart feeling slightly grubby (compounded later by the motel receptionist who tells me she doesn’t shop there “because they use child labour”) and head to Perkins Family Restaurant for pancakes and syrup and all that stuff i would never normally eat for breakfast but somehow seems right surrounded by doughy-faced parents feeding up their dough-kids on a saturday morning.

Josh arrives at 11 in a hired convertible. He’s been here for a week already filming with Richard and his daughter and staying with them out at Richard’s ‘Portable Ranch House’. He seems relieved the second unit has arrived. Richard is stocking up on supplies at a huge outlet called Sam’s Club so we use the time to trade the hire car in for something more practical.

When we get to Sam’s Club Josh and I request an audience with the manager to check we can film, and it turns out Richard and ‘Dale’ have already had words, and it’s all good. Try that in ASDA in Weston-Super-Mare.

I meet Richard for the first time at the checkout. He’s got a trolley piled high with meat and cheese, with a token bag of peppers thrown in for colour. He’s wearing a hat with a feather in and gives me a warm handshake and a big smile. We’ve spoken on the phone, but never actually met before. We’re going to be spending the next six weeks together on this journey so it’s fairly important that we get along.

As we film him leaving Richard keeps bumping in to people he knows. One guy - Frank - sporting a Vietnam Vet baseball cap (66-68 apparently) looks like he’s seen some action. Then Richard runs in to ‘D’ who he’s been trying to track down for a while, and they agree to do some work together the following day which we can film.



There’s so much protein in the trunk the car is wheezing on its axles. We trade it in again for some more space and get a beaten up old Buick then head to church for confession. The heater is broken so it’s full blast or nothing. Richard gets a load off his mind inside with the Father and we take off to drop the shopping at his place.

The PRH is out in the sticks. There’s an ancient truck with a huge plastic vat on the back which is how Richard gets water out here. It has no brakes or lights. Josh picks up his stuff, and we head in to Spearfish to find a motel.

Molly on the front desk of the Best Western wins us over. There’s a hunting show on the TV in our room. A breathless, camouflaged, man-of-the-forest is gushing after killing a deer with a high powered bow and arrow “If i got any more excited I think i’d explode!” he exclaims as he strokes the antlers of the unfortunate recently deceased beast.

By the time we’ve unpacked and sorted out the kit we’re both knackered so after a couple of beers it’s bedtime.

We Travel To Travel




“Garbage! Garbage!” barks the air hostess as she works the Northwest Airlines aisles. Not quite the pale blue vision on KLM who apologised profusely for their lack of tomato juice. Northwest is full of American kids - a choir, it turns out - chattering loudly and being extremely sociable with anyone who makes eye contact. I bury myself in Quantum of Solace, and then Sideways, which has had all the swearwords dubbed out - Laid becomes Loved (as in “I’m going to get LOVED and you’re not going to stop me”) but my favourite is “her husband caught me on the floor with my fingers in her COOKIE JAR”.

The Indian kid sitting next to me spends the flight watching cartoons and filling out exam papers. He’s part of the choir. It’s his birthday, and there’s an announcement by the captain, who says he’ll be easy to recognise because “he’s the one with the red face now”. Only of course he doesn’t have a red face at all. He rolls his eyes and enjoys the attention.

The 3 hour stopover in Minnesota passes quickly. I wrestle with a payphone and book a room at Foothills Inn, where Josh stayed last week.

The air hostess for the final leg from Minnesota to Rapid City has to walk up and down the aisle in crab-like fashion, she’s just a bit too broad for the straight-up approach. She’s great - she makes small talk to everyone and works the crowd as she hands out soft drinks and snack boxes. When she gets to me, we talk about London, England. She went there once and had “crazy fun”.

I arrive in Rapid City to the news that North Dakota is facing massive flooding, and residents of Fargo and Moorhead (both places we’re set to spend time in) are sandbagging furiously and preparing their defences. Not the welcome we were expecting.




Sunday, March 15, 2009

The Partial Redemption of Richard Kuchera


A feature length documentary following enigmatic rascal Richard Kuchera on a journey of self-discovery as he seeks to right the wrongs of his past.

69-year-old Dick, or Richard as he now prefers to be called, lives alone in a trailer in the Black Hills of Dakota, a rugged and charismatic country that seems to suit him down to the ground. Rude, Intelligent, witty, childish, loving, honest, deceitful, aggressive and yet charming Richard is, as the Kris Kristofferson song says ‘…a walking contradiction, partly truth and partly fiction.’

Richard has done some pretty despicable things in his life and over the years has pissed off and become estranged from many of those closest to him. Yet as the years catch up with him, Richard begins to question a life lived distinctly on his terms. His addiction recovery group says he should clean up his side of the street. His Catholic faith says repent.

We follow Richard as he makes a list of all those he has wronged and embarks on a life-changing journey to make amends to such people wherever possible.

As Richard tracks down the friends, loved ones and business associates whose lives he has impacted on like a car crash, we learn more of this complex maverick as he takes us on an unpredictable road trip through America’s heartlands and back through his eventful life.

The Filmmakers

Director Joshua Neale, has a diverse background in drama and documentary, including working alongside Pawel Pawlikowski on the Bafta winning film My Summer of Love and writing and directing the acclaimed short film Flowers and Coins.

In 2006 Joshua directed his first broadcast documentary, the chilling and inventive, The Boy who Killed his Best Friend. Joshua’s distinctive voice as a filmmaker truly emerged with Karaoke Soul  which mixes intimate observational documentary with musical performances from the central characters. This was followed by Cotton Wool Kids for Channel 4’s ‘Cutting Edge’ strand.

Joshua aims to continue to make bold creative films with human stories at their heart. He is currently on the road looking for redemption, his central character’s or his own remains open to question. Time will tell. 

Associate Producer Andrew Hinton is riding shotgun. He has worked in documentary for over a decade and was recently an artist in residence at Southbank Centre in London. He has seen the ocean.

Producer Sandra Whipham is a freelance executive producer and documentary consultant. Previously she worked at Channel 4 where she was Editor, More 4, and oversaw the True Stories international documentary strand.  She co-produced films including Burma VJ, Afghan Star and Jesus Politics and and acquired the best of international feature documentary, including Trouble the Water, No End In Sight, Shutka Book of Records,and Billy The Kid. She is a regular participant at international pitching forums and markets and was a guest industry tutor at the IDFA Summer School in 2008.

Sandra did not visit the Dakotas on this occasion but looks forward to attending the world premiere in Fargo.

The Road Is Our Teacher


As a Great American may or may not have said once said ‘The Road is our Teacher.’ From Badlands to Easy Rider I’ve always been fascinated by the American road trip, the endless roads that touch the horizon, the truck stop encounters, the possibility of freedom (sometimes false) that the great land seems to promise. When I first heard tales of  ‘Dick’ from a former girlfriend Kelli (Richard’s daughter) he seemed liked a character from one of the great American novels or movies. Part Huck Finn, part Ignatius J. Reilly. Larger than life, hero and anti-hero, a fierce individual.  It was all there -  women, guns, religion, drugs, booze, and the open road.

The road journey is at once personal and yet universal. As the landscapes fly past the open window, through dying small towns and flooded corn fields your story inevitably crosses and touches other’s stories and for a moment connects, before heading on to the next encounter. And maybe you learn something. Or at least have something new to think about.

Richard’s journey I believe is going to be undeniably eventful, emotional, chaotic and transformative. And we are along for the ride. This blog is really a collection of our own thoughts and observations on the road as we stumble at the unpredictable heels of Richard. Not really a ‘making of’ as such, more of a road diary. As for what happens on Richard's journey? Well you’ll have to wait for the film for that one. 

Joshua Neale, Director