Day 5: The Day the Earth Stood Still

Carl told us we were on the cusp of something big. We thought we had something on the drive out. Everyday here we've grown more and more convinced that this is a long term project. Today we started to quantify those feelings.

What we've got here isn't a ten day shoot. It's gonna have to be a lot longer than that. We're going to have to find a place. We're going to have to roll the dice. We're putting our cards on the table and going all in.

The story we've uncovered is beyond what we thought we would find, and we're the only outfit in town.


We had planned to wake up earlier today than normal. We were aiming for 8, but when you factor in how late we stay up talking/blogging and the fact that the Stagecoach Inn, where we're staying, has amazingly comfortable beds... we woke up at 10:30. But when we got up we found that PJ had pretty much our whole day planned out for us. That's the awesome thing about PJ, he's got an incredible entrepreneurial spirit, at the mere mention or an idea or concept, he's on his phone, texting and calling and setting up an interview with someone, this particular time it was an extremely well informed deck hand named bailey and the municipal tourism promotions manager who were in our kitchen before we even know they were coming, and we got a great interview out of it. PJ's got an insane network, and he's behind us and our idea one hundred percent. It's awesome that the's got such an insatiable passion to see the lobster industry grow and change to help the communities that are really struggling.

And he knows about struggling communities.

Because after our interview with Bailey, PJ had us get into a van with our gear and the woman who runs The Stagecoach Inn, Lilly-Anna, who drove us to down the road to Clarks Harbor. Clarks Harbor is not only PJ's hometown, but the hometown of his family going back generations. He started telling us about the town as we drove into this picturesque location. So we rolled on him. He told us every story about the town as we got out and explored it's warf, streets and shoreline. He explained how the only boats in the warf were lobster boats. He told us how lobster alone sustained this small town for generations, and with all the fishermen leaving (for various reasons, I don't want to spoil the show for you) the town had shrunk. Their convenience store is gone, the town's amazing b&b is gone, the movie theatre and parlour his family once owned is gone, even the elementary school is gone. It's all slipping away, leaving the only businesses left here being lobster buyers and a bait shop. Because the only industry in that whole town is lobster, and it's not providing enough for these fishermen anymore, so they leave, so the town shrinks, and shrinks until there'll be nothing left.

It was a great morning of shooting, getting to know everything about PJ's backstory and his family and the home they made for themselves that's largely been sold off to the highest bidder. We got great footage too.

PJ then took us to dinner, and along the way we met more people, got more contact information and ended up having dinner with James Mood and his right hand man at 1688, Steven. But of course we had thought this was a dinner run, and we didn't have our cameras. But it was still a great conversation and we learned a lot about what James Mood is actually like, and what his viewpoints are.  He wants to get the price per pound of lobster from the buyers to 5 dollars per pound and to do that he says he needs to unite the fishermen. But beyond that.... I don't know what his plans are, I don't think anyone knows exactly what he'd do if he managed to unite the fishermen under his 1688 banner, other than call for a strike, which could work, but from what we've seen and heard at the 1688 meeting tonight and the night before, he doesn't have much of a plan to win back many of the fishermen he's alienated with his extreme and brash viewpoints and conduct. But his heart is in the right place, and what he's asking and proposing is not an invalid option, if it were successfully implemented it could very well sustain many in the community who would not be able to with out a buying price increase. He's a tough man to read. I'm still not quite sure what to make of him. He's very passionate, that much I can say for sure, and the meeting we just filmed is proof positive of that in more ways than one.

The meeting was rowdy at times with PJ clashing heads with one of the boat captains and James Mood, for merely suggesting trying to work with the buyers. He then spoke about how the internet changes business and even made me speak up in a room full of mostly old, grisled fishermen, why the internet matters to the world.

I had to explain the internet's importance to a large group of people, in 2012.

Needless to say it was eventful, i could go on for a long time about it, but it's late and I must move on.

After all this we got back to the inn and after attempting to define PJ's and Lobster.ca/CAL's involvement in our project, Lobster Inc. it became clear to us that this is no short term project, this is no DIY home movie, it's a real project that if we're going to do it right, will probably take about 8 months of work to do. That's a real amount of time, for an incredibly real project. We need real money. So we've devised a plan to try to find some funds, and once we've outlined our objectives and put together som proposals and presentations we'll be hunting funding down, for cost of the film, and also the cost of sustain ourselves (Mom, that means making money, in film). Tomorrow we'll be doing some filming that we've already scheduled as we try to get our ducks in a row in the next week. You will all be hearing more about these efforts as they develop. But the point is that this just got real, and we may have bitten off a lot here, but that means we need to just chew harder. We're chasing a story and a dream, and we're not leaving until we've caught them both.

It's time to rock out, with the docks about.

Down.

Set.

Hut.

-Matt

P.S. I just want to thank everyone for reading, I've had over 300 total page views on here and that's all you, I love hearing feedback and your reactions to what we're doing, feel free to tweet at me (@brisbianajones)  and follow my exploits on facebook. I also want to say a quick Hi to Ben, Hannah, Phillip, Mom and Dad who I know are reading these. I miss you all very much.