For the first time in Canada, young people in their late 20s living in Vancouver and Edmonton are divulging highly personal information on the Internet. So far, the material has never been viewed or published.

Playing It Safe is a website launched with the sponsorship of the National Film Board (NFB). It is also a national social action project—it educates and warns youth who are likely at risk of death or extreme poverty. The site broadcasts mini-documentaries, or webisodes, these young people have shot themselves. Presented in a raw, urgent and taboo-free way, these videos reveal their current high-risk daily life featuring violence, crime, coping with HIV or Hepatitis C, loneliness, street life, drug addiction and mental illness. There is no room for melodrama. Instead, these young people are proud, courageous and generous in sharing their daily struggle to stay safe and alive. The testimonies are touching, profoundly human and highly inspiring.

Hywel Tuscano and Renaud Boulet are social workers at the Vancouver YouthCO Aids Society. They have directly participated in preparing and directing some of these documentaries.

“Our centre welcomes young people aged 19 to 30 who have contracted HIV or Hepatitis C,” says Hywel. “For the Playing It Safe project, YouthCO has focused on young people in their late 20s.”

“The selection process was based on the maturity displayed by the young people, in addition to their ability to understand what is going on in their lives,” Renaud says.

The project got underway in Feb. 2008, selected participants were trained in storytelling and filming during four eight-hour days. From the design and writing to the final editing, each video required between 30 and 40 hours of work.

“Certainly the challenge was technical, but more importantly, we had to handle the consequences of their addictions and routines during the filming and interviews,” explains Hywel. “For example, some showed up an hour late to our meetings, others were still under the influence of drugs. We had to adjust to those conditions, while remaining impartial,” adds Renaud.

Hywel and Renaud noticed that their filmmakers got a better understanding and a real awareness of their current situation from the project.

“Our participants wondered about taking care of themselves in a better way and also about the urgent need to find solutions to their problems. Some of the others have also gradually begun to accept the importance of their therapy,” says Renaud.

Playing It Safe created a closer relationship between the social workers and the youth involved in the project. “As the filmmaking process evolved, we got into their homes, their daily lives, their opinions about their problems and about life in general,” concludes Hywel.

New webisodes are shown every week on the site. In addition to broadcasts on the Internet, the videos have been screened during university conferences, such as at UBC. Attendees at Red Cross and YouthCO workshops have watched these stories also.

The documentaries have been presented to mental health professionals, the Canadian Association for HIV Research, the Canadian AIDS Treatment Information Exchange, the Alberta Harm Reduction conference, at the Vancouver Queer Film Festival, and the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transsexual (LGBT) festival in Torino, Italy.

Based on Edmonton filmmaker Terri Wynnyk’s original idea, Playing It Safe has been launched and managed by the NFB, Vancouver YouthCO Aids Society, and iHuman Youth Society along with the Youth Restorative Action Project in Edmonton.

Check it out at
www.playing-it-safe.nfb.ca

Translation Dominic Rossi