April 21 2010 » News Clippings » Interior News
Awakening the Skeena Premiers at Home
Wetsu'weten Chief, Roy Morris opens the premier with a traditional song & drumming
~Dan Mesec, Smithers Interior News
Andrew Eddy, Ali Howard and an amazing group of individuals that completed the 650 kilometre adventure down the Skeena River last summer were all on hand for the first screening of the new documentary Awakening the Skeena last Monday at the
Roi Theater.
“We’re here in Smithers for the first screening of Awakening the Skeena, which is the film about Ali Howard’s swim of the Skeena River this past summer, so it’s our chance to bring it home and show a lot of people the film, people who helped us out and were part of the big adventure,” said Eddy, a Toronto-based film maker.
Gas giant Shell is planing on drilling for Coal Bed Methane at the Sacred Headwaters of the Skeena River, a major spawning ground for Pacific Salmon. So last summer Ali Howard and a team of concerned conservationists decided to follow Howard as she swam the entire length of the Skeena River in an attempt to bring the issue to the masses and push for a permeant moratorium on the drilling in the Sacred Headwaters.
“I hope people will get the message of hope. I hope they appreciate the amazing commitment that an individual made, that Ali made. That they draw from that belief that they can make a difference them selves in whatever they do. But also to realize that we all don’t have to do big things, if we all did little things they would move ahead. And I also hope they appreciate the theme that some times out of sight is out of mind and you need to tell your story to a bigger audience can appreciate that there’s something pretty amazing up here that needs protecting,” Eddy said.
Currently the film is on tour throught the northwest and over the next eleven months will be shown around Canada and will premier on cable television later this year.
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