Taking a Stander on filmmaking

Toronto director Bronwen Hughes tackles true-life crime in new South African movie

Though Toronto-born filmmaker Bronwen Hughes is not a household name in Canada, her movies are very familiar. Harriet the Spy is a children's favourite, and Forces of Nature garnered quite a bit of money for stars Sandra Bullock and Ben Affleck. With her latest film Hughes, who currently lives in the U.S., tackles a true-life drama in Stander.
In 1976 Andre Charles Stander (Thomas Jane) was the youngest Captain in the Johannesburg Police Force when he killed an unarmed black youth while on Riot Duty. This had such a profound effect on him that he began robbing banks. Caught, Stander was sentenced to 75 years of hard labour at Zonderwater Prison. However, prison only served to introduce Andre to his future partners in crime: Allan Heyl (David Patrick O'Hara) and Patrick "Lee" McCall (Dexter Fletcher). After they escaped from jail, the "Stander Gang" robbed a total of more than 20 banks in six months, before a twist of fate and bad luck brought the downfall of the gang.
Tandem talked to Bronwen Hughes when she was in Toronto recently.

Did you have any hesitation about filming in South Africa?
"I had no hesitation. When I get a gut reaction to the idea of a film or screenplay that is sent to me I will hold my nose, jump in and think later. I find that if you think too hard, you find too many reasons not to take that risk. I wasn't so preoccupied with the danger risk of South Africa, as much as the career risk, because there is no slam-dunk that anything is going to really work for you. I actually thought I knew a thing or two about South Africa before going there. I've been to my share of Free Nelson Mandela, Hugh Masekela concerts, but when I got there it was more complex then I ever imagined. People advised me to not drive alone, not drive at night, and if I did drive at night I'd have to run the reds like they do. I was like 'Dude you don't get it, I live in Manhattan' and after a few days I realized I had no idea, it is a totally different ball game. You can't live in fear and just never go out. I think it's a more inclined way of living, you have to adopt certain precautions and just get on with it, which is how South Africans live."
How did this project land on your lap?
"Peter Hoffman who put the film financing together, had been trying to make this film for at least 10-15 years. He was looking for the right director. Actually he could not get the film made before the change in regime. We needed the cooperation of the government and of the South African Police. So years went by, and finally he was able to put it together in a real way, the South Africans contributed with the co-production of financing, which made it even better. And when he needed a director, not only did I have two of the co-production passports, Canadian and British, but I was also a bankable director, because my previous films made a lot of money, and that is what independent financiers look for. It's a big irony actually, the indies want someone with big studio success under their belt in order to invest their money and the studios want someone who is a big indie, adventurous. So I hope to be able to swing both ways. Peter offered it too me, because I was a bankable director and he liked how off-centre my previous films were."

What was your first reaction when you read the screenplay?
"My first reaction was, 'Yes give it to me, yes this is something I've never read before, and never would have imagined and I want in.' That was the gut reaction and subsequent to that all the nervousness comes about, like 'Is this the kind of film I should be doing for my career?' One of the reasons is, a director, unlike an actor, cannot make a few movies a year, at most one a year, and almost never that quickly. So the nervousness set in on a creative way. But by then the ball is rolling, you're meeting actors and you're already in it. By then the idea of not having opportunities seemed worst than the risk I was taking in the first place."

Although many of the characters are dead, their memories are still fresh for South Africans. Was living up to that a concern?
"When you are isolated in a room in L.A. or Toronto and doing your initial thinking about what it might be, it's much easier to plan out the dramatic structure of the characters. When you get to South Africa, you find yourself looking into the eyes of people who know better, and then the weight of responsibility settles. I don't have the guts or the nerve to bulldoze across the absolute truth. I am always going to search for the truth in essence, although inevitably the time line gets collapsed; there will always be dramatic license. But I cannot bulldoze something that is absolute against fact and try to pull it off as the right idea. The biggest responsibility I felt in that whole time was when I met Allen Heyl, who is the only one of the bank robbers still alive, and in jail. In all the years of trying to make this movie, no one actually went to talk to him. I had to weasel my way into meeting him. He was this very deep-thinking man, who spent 25 years in prison in self examination, trying to figure out what made him the angry young man he once was."

He was cooperative?
"Originally he was mistrustful of anything to do with what would show him as a thug. He finally opened up to me and started to tell me everything, he relayed entire conversations he had with Andrea, long discussions they had in prison. Why they did it, how they did it, the adrenaline rush, how they felt afterwards and the loneliness and fear that sets in when you realize you've crossed the line and can never cross back. On the question of responsibility, I had a screen lay in my hand which was an excellent action movie, and it had this character, Allan Heyl, who was a thug. I realized if I put this out in the world, this film which people adopt as the truth, I would be damming him to prison forever as a bad man, and yet I was looking at someone totally different. I re-wrote his character from the ground up to include the things he was telling me, including the reason he got into crime in the first place."

Did he see the film?
"He has seen it on a very bad videotape, with terrible sound. If you saw a movie about yourself, it's not going to be the truth, so mostly he is offended by what is left out. But there's no time, not to mention he has a slight jealousy that it's the Stander gang and not the Allan Heyl gang. It's the double edge thing; he wants the dark side of his life to go away and when he sees it he wants it to be correct."

Is Andrea's father, who's prominent in the film, still alive?
"No. He died not to long ago, which is another reason I think the film was able to get made. There was a story prior to my arrival on the scene that they were researching and he had agreed to meet them and at the last minute changed his mind. It's such a painful episode in that family's history that they just want it to go away. The other thing is, before he died the South African police never would have cooperated with the film in the way they cooperated with us. We had secret police files, hardware, vehicles, advisors, uniforms which we all needed to make the film. While General Stander was alive, in respect to him, they would not have cooperated in that way because it was digging up a very nasty episode."

Thomas Jane carries the film, and from at the time of his casting he was only a supporting actor. Was he your choice?
"My main objective was to hire a great actor and the financiers want people on posters that they know people will go see, but they are not interested in doing movies that won't pay their fees or are enormously risky. So you're left with the list of people who are right for the role among those actors not in the George Clooney category. I wanted the right one for the role. When I saw Thomas' work all lined up I barely remembered that it was the same guy in all those movies because he so transforms from one to the next, and as I researched Andrea Stander and met people who knew him first hand, and knew him as close personal friends, they all described him very differently, as if he too transformed in this way and became who he needed to be in any given situation."

What are you working on now?
"I have a couple things I hope to be doing. One is based on the a story of the youngest photojournalist who worked for Reuters. The story is really about the way he lived, he was a great traveler, beautiful, and he would always do humanitarian things disguised as great adventure. He was just a really bright light and artist and he was killed. Or I could be doing a surfing film about Lisa Anderson, who is a four times world champion who put women's surfing on the map. I also just started working on a true story of three generations of female spies."

Stander is currently playing in local cinemas.

Publication Date: 2004-12-12
Story Location: http://tandemnews.com/viewstory.php?storyid=4708