If there’s one topic that is guaranteed to fire up Vancouverites, it’s housing.
Our housing woes are real. Rapidly rising prices have made home ownership an unattainable dream for many. Rental stock is diminishing in quantity but increasing in cost. Homes of all sizes and conditions sit unoccupied all over the city, their owners cashing in from other neighborhoods, out of province, or distant climes.
But even though we can’t stop talking about our housing woes, “the conversation is rarely very complete,” says documentary filmmaker Charles Wilkinson, who deep-dives into our city’s housing woes in his new feature-length documentary, Vancouver: No Fixed Address.
“I’ve been in coffee shops and overheard someone talking about government intervention, or a lack thereof, and somebody else chimes in with, ‘Well, it’s the Chinese, it’s their fault,’ and it completely derails the debate,” says Wilkinson, whose film kicks off an extended run at VIFF’s Vancity Theatre on May 19 after screening to sold-out houses at Hot Docs in Toronto and locally at DOXA Documentary Film Festival.
Wilkinson says he was compelled to “examine each one of the things that people say are the cause of the problem with people who actually know what they’re talking about.” Thus, Vancouver: No Fixed Address is divided into five acts, each investigating the crisis from a different angle: The Boom, The Back Story, Race, The New Normal, and Money. “My sense of it was it’s very difficult to resolve a problem until you understand it, and we’re still at the spot where we don’t really get it yet,” Says Wilkinson.
Wilkinson (along with co-producer and co-editor Tina Schliessler and executive producers Kevin Eastwood and Murray Battle) won accolades and critical acclaim for Oil Sands Karaoke (2013) and Haida Gwaii: On the Edge of the World (2015) – documentaries that showcased the consequences of oil extraction and pipeline expansion on northern and island communities.
This latest documentary is a natural continuation of his previous films, according to Wilkinson. “We were making these environmental documentaries about our northern regions being threatened by the over-commercial exploitation of the resources there in the region, and it occurred to me that my environment, the environment that I personally live in, is Vancouver,” Wilkinson explains. “This is our reality. This is our environment, and it is by all accounts under threat from the exploitation of the region.”
Wilkinson and co. logged revealing interviews with a who’s who of housing experts and stakeholders, including environmentalist David Suzuki, Mayor Gregor Robertson, and “condo king” Bob Rennie, as well as Vancouverites whose lives have been profoundly impacted by the housing crunch. We hear from a man who lives in his car at a West Side beach, a widow who worries about making rent payments on her West End apartment, and a longtime Vancouverite selling the family home to out-of-towners for a huge sum. We hear from giddy new homeowners, locals who are reimagining living situations (including tiny homes and shared housing), and people who have been displaced and ignored.
Wilkinson says he was surprised to learn during filming that the bulk of new out-of-town and in-town speculation leads to unoccupied homes – a percentage he says could be as high as 90%. “That was really a revelation, because these aren’t people who are looking to raise a family in our city or contribute to the community,” says Wilkinson. “It’s purely an investment. It’s a safety deposit box, which they may or may not even rent out.”
But the rising tide of market forces is meeting something that has the potential to be just as powerful: the deep love that so many have for this city. “The spirit of people here is as such that, even in spite of everything that’s happened and that’s happening, people love this city so much, and they feel that it’s worth fighting for,” says Wilkinson. But what they lack, adds the director, is a “catalyst, somewhere to focus their energy, to stop this train and tell the people who are driving it that housing shouldn’t be a commodity.”
Vancouver: No Fixed Address was well received during its Toronto premiere, says Wilkinson, although numerous audience members questioned his choice to include shots of Vancouver’s iconic beaches, mountains, and forests in a documentary about an ugly situation. “We want people to understand what’s at stake, and what’s at stake is losing one of the most beautiful spots on Earth,” says Wilkinson, before conceding, “It’s hard to present any kind of a gloomy picture in a place that is insanely beautiful.”
In Wilkinson’s mind, staying put is a form of resistance, and he intends to do just that. “That’s the way Tina and I feel. We’re staying. I know it’s a place that’s really worth fighting for, so I think we need to forgo the short-term gain.”
Vancouver: No Fixed Address screens May 19 to June 8 at VIFF Vancity Theatre. Tickets at https://www.viff.org/Online/default.asp?BOparam::WScontent::loadArticle::permalink=fc9295-vancouver-no-fixed-address.
