Captured: Once-imprisoned American filmmakers to show documentary at Big Sky Film Festival

by Justin Franz | February 19, 2010 | Montana Kaimin

When Sandy Cioffi and Tammi Sims received a standing ovation last April, they knew they’d come a long way from the Nigerian prison they were kept in a year earlier.

The applause was for their new documentary “Sweet Crude,” which recently premiered at the Full Frame Documentary Film Festival in Durham, N.C. The film, which took more than four years to make, examines the human rights issues in the oil-rich nation of Nigeria, a country that provides the United States with more oil than Iraq and Kuwait combined. A showing of “Sweet Crude” will kick off the last two days of the 2010 Big Sky Documentary Film Festival at the Wilma Theater.

The film’s showing in Missoula is a sort of homecoming for Sims, who now lives in Seattle but is originally from Montana and attended the University of Montana for a year.

Sims never meant to be the type of person making films and hanging out at documentary film festivals. In fact, in late 2005, Sims was just another volunteer on the Niger Delta, helping to build a library for a small village. It was then she met Cioffi, who had been hired to film the construction for a documentary being put together by the nonprofit organization in charge of the project.

But what they would come home with was more than just footage of people lending a helping hand.

What they saw was the powerful grip of a corrupt military government and oil companies that have oppressed the local population of the Niger Delta. It was an experience that stayed with them, Sims said.

“I witnessed the conditions of the people there and when I got home I wanted to do more to help the people,” she said.

She signed on to help Cioffi make a film to further examine this problem. While many people there followed a code of non-violent protest, young students began to revolt in the mid-2000s, resulting in a militant group called the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta.

So in August 2006, Cioffi and a crew of producers and cameramen returned to tell the story as it quickly unfolded.

Nigeria has been a hotbed of oil exploration for over a half century, and while billions of dollars worth of crude oil is taken from the country every year, the people who live there see little-to-none of that money. Most who call the Niger Delta home live in poverty, even though it is projected that five years from now the United States will get 25 percent of its oil there. Also, oil spills and unregulated production had seriously harmed the area fish population and farming lands, crippling some of the region’s most important industries. 

It was a story that Cioffi had to tell, she said, adding that human rights issues in Africa are only noticed after tragedy.

“I wanted to make ‘Hotel Rwanda’ before it happened,” she said. “This is the most urgent human rights situation today that is preventable.”

Following the first trip, she and her crew returned in December 2006 and again in April 2008. A week into filming during the latter trip, five crewmembers, including Sims and Cioffi, were on a boat heading to another video shoot when they were arrested by members of the Nigerian military.

The arrest was completely illegal, Cioffi said, because the entire crew held visas stating that their purpose in the country was to make a film. But the solders didn’t care and piled the filmmakers into a military boat that was taken to shore.

Sims acted quickly and, while the solders weren’t watching, she called another producer who had stayed behind in Seattle. Luckily for the crew, her phone had a cell signal and their associate back home stirred out of bed at 1:30 a.m. and picked up the phone.

As quickly as she could, while making sure to be out of sight of their captors, Sims told the friend what had happened and their location. After that she left her phone on silent and occasionally texted updates about what was happening and where they were going.

Even today, Sims said she doesn’t know why the soldiers didn’t immediately take the phone away.

Seven hours after their capture, a soldier finally took the phone, but by then, it didn’t matter. The gears were already in motion for their rescue, Cioffi said.

 Even though they were in a troublesome situation, the crew knew that this could happen and was prepared for such an occurrence.

“They were trying to intimidate journalists until they just don’t cover the story anymore,” she said. “That’s the primary danger when you are telling the story of a voiceless people who have been put down by oil companies and a military government.”

When the military saw the filmmakers, they felt that they would be another target of military intimidation. And an easy one.

“They thought we were obscure nobodies and that no one would come after us,” she said.

Back in the United States, their friend in Seattle had contacted lawyers and the U.S. embassy in Nigeria. Within hours, U.S. senators from Washington and Montana, including Jon Tester and Max Baucus, were racing a letter around Congress to be sent to the president of Nigeria, demanding the crew’s release.

While lawmakers moved quickly, Cioffi and Sims sat in a jail cell, far from home, thinking about what was going to happen to them.

“Those were the most terrifying moments of my life,” Cioffi said. “No matter how well you mentally prepare for it, you can’t imagine being in a truck with young men with guns or being interrogated for eight hours until you live it.”

But for Sims, trying to get out of the situation was what kept her going.

“We certainty knew that there was a risk,” she said. “We knew we could be held for a long time, but it’s also amazing how fast that human survival instinct kicks in … we thought about (the danger), but I was less concerned about that and more focused on getting out.”

For the seven days, the crew was held captive by the Nigerian military. Sims and Cioffi were held in the same cell and said they were able to reflect on what was happening to them. What they realized is that they were lucky compared to those who call the small African nation home. They also realized that their treatment was likely better than many others who had experienced a similar scenario, because they were Americans.

“Some of the aspects of our conditions were better than what most Nigerians deal with every day,” Sims said, but added that even then, in that jail cell, they believed in what they were doing.

“We thought, ‘Wow, did I really intend to become a martyr for this?’” she said. “And the answer was, ‘Absolutely.’”

But they weren’t going to become martyrs for their cause. They weren’t going to die making this film, because seven days after they were taken prisoner, they were released under pressure from the American government. They were going home.

Yet it wasn’t an experience that could just be left behind, they said.

“It changed me,” Sims said. “I hope it is in ways that help me clarify my values and how I spend my life.”

While their lives were changed, Cioffi said it didn’t alter the purpose of the film, and it was her decision to leave out their own personal experiences in prison, with the exception of a short postscript at the end, explaining what happened to the crew.  

“I didn’t want to make my discomfort and that of a few others overshadow the real human rights issues down there,” Cioffi said.

That wasn’t the only reason they excluded what happened. All the video they captured up until their arrest was taken from them, Sims said, and is still in the hands of the Nigerian government. But even without the footage from that trip, it’s a strong film, Sims said.

“In the end I think it made it a stronger movie and I’m enormously proud of the final product,” she said.

It’s a final product that Cioffi said has been well received and she hopes that people leave the theater with a much better understanding of what is happening in Nigeria and the human costs of oil production there.
 
“Every time they pump gas into their tank, they’ll think about the choice they are making,” she said.

Both she and Sims hope that the film will rally international attention for the issue with showings across Europe and North America.

“We’ve always wanted it to be a tool for change,” Sims said.

She hopes to continue making documentaries about human rights issues that will make a difference. 

“It has a role to play there … telling the history of oil companies and corruption in Nigeria. And the audience will have a better understanding when they see it,” Sims said.

“Sweet Crude” will be shown at the Wilma Theater as part of the Big Sky Documentary Film Festival on Saturday morning at 10 a.m. More information is available at http://www.sweetcrudemovie.com and http://www.bigskyfilmfest.org.

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