Public Radio for Alaska's Bristol Bay
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Director Mark Titus premieres his film "The Wild" in Bristol Bay

Sage Smiley/KDLG

After screenings in Naknek and Dillingham, director Mark Titus is taking his new film about Bristol Bay around the country.

 

 

The film is called “The Wild.” In it, Titus, covers developments to the project since 2015. Its message is strongly opposed to the project. Titus features local figures who have long spoken out against the mine, including Alannah Hurley, the executive director of the United Tribes of Bristol Bay, and Nushagak Point fisherman Ole Olson. Titus also interviews Pebble Limited Partnership CEO Tom Collier and Chairman of the Board John.

“The central question in the movie is ‘how do you save what you love?’ It’s not ‘how do you destroy what you hate?’” Titus said. “Intentionally, it’s about love, and it’s about celebrating, venerating, and ultimately wanting to protect those things that we love.”

In the film, Titus tells his own story of overcoming addiction as well. He decided to merge the narratives of the fight against Pebble Mine and his personal struggle after an epiphany about the similarities between addictive behavior and continued habitat degradation in the US.

“The metaphor is exactly on point. With… Hey, this is where we are as a society, this is where we are as a species, this is where we are as a country. We’ve been repeating this behavior over and over and over again in relation to the planet that gives us our life sustaining nutrients and we can’t continue that story,” he said.

Titus first came to Bristol Bay when he was 18 to work at a packing plant. He says he fell in love with the area and felt deeply connected to something bigger than himself. With “The Wild,” Titus hopes to connect viewers nationwide with the people who live here.

“My hope is that we can take this story, which is a very intensely personal story for me, and offer that to the rest of the country,” he said.

This is Titus’s second film about Bristol Bay. His first film, “The Breach,” premiered in 2014.

Contact the author at sage@kdlg.org or 907-842-2200.