Hubert Davis

Hubert Davis emerged in the 2000's as one of Toronto's most singular voices. Starting in
2002 with his short One Little Finger, then in 2004 with Hardwood -which garnered him a nomination for Best Short Documentary at the Academy Awards - his interest in personal relationships and the effects of one's environment on their development has expanded from family to community with his newest feature doc Invisible City, while in the meantime venturing to fiction with his short Aruba (2006).

With a ton of respect towards his protagonists and a genuine intention of getting involved in the intricacies of broken relationships that must be built on something new, Davis has proven to be a solid filmmaker that seems to work alongside human stories rather than simply making films about them.

In Invisible City, we follow young black men in Regent Park who struggle at school, with their families, but mostly with their identity and where their lives will take them. As an audience, we get to submerge ourselves in their realities and start thinking with them as to what the next steps should be, what indeed the possibilities are.

With your first feature now released, how do you trace it back to your beginnings as a filmmaker?

I've wanted to make films since I was in high school, but I never really thought it was a realistic career choice. After university, I decided I needed to get a job in the film business to really see what it was all about. My first real job was at an editing house working as an assistant editor. That's really where my "film school" began -seeing the behind the scenes of how other director's work, what seemed to work and not work - ultimately, starting to inform me about what kind of stories I wanted to tell.

For your two documentaries, you go deep into people's personal situations, the things they have to work through. In the case of Hardwood, it's your own family, and in Invisible City, it's couple of youths in Regent Park and the adults surrounding them. How do you get them to open up?

I think in general I come from a place of empathy and respect.

I really enjoy listening to people's stories. As a filmmaker you have this great opportunity to understand someone better - understand what makes someone the person they are - and every once in awhile you get a chance to reveal small moments of truth. Those moments are golden.

These films undoubtedly have big impacts on audiences. Do you think they do on the protagonists as well? Do you think in a way your involvement pushes them to action and reflection?

Someone once told me with each film you make you learn something about yourself. I think that's very true for myself but also for the people in my films. I don't think my films necessarily pushed anyone into action but I do think they helped people in the films to reflect.

In making Hardwood my family really got a better understanding of each other's lives. Through Invisible City the boys got a better understanding of themselves through my camera lens - it reflected who they are and also how they are portraying themselves.

Location is crucial in your films, in the sense that it informs a lot of what goes on internally. What is your relationship to Toronto and its outskirts?

Toronto is my adopted city. I grew up in Vancouver - which after 10 years living in Toronto - isn't really my home now either. For the most part, I feel a bit like an outsider in both places. But I find that kind of a good place to be as a filmmaker because you have some distance - you are better able to observe things from the outside.

You've made two short fiction films in the past. Do you plan on doing more of them in the future? Perhaps a feature? What's next?

I'm in development working on a couple of dramatic features. I love documentaries for their ability to tell a story in such a raw and unfiltered way. The way people look, speak, and react is everything you can't dream of in fiction. That being said I want to make dramatic films that capture some of that rawness from my documentary work.

Previously on blogTO -- Behind the Doc: Hubert Davis