Ian Evans is set to release Lunatic, a documentary telling the story of his trip to the South Pole and beyond.
“I think a lot of people know that I went to Antarctica; people stopped me in the street when I was towing the tire around town and wished me the best and I think this is a conclusion of that,” Evans said.
“They can see and relive with me what it was like to be in Antarctica … and it closes the loop for all those people that wonder ‘what is it like?’ and they may never get to go to Antarctica, in fact, everyone in the audience – probably none of them will get to go.”
Evans completed his 44-day pilgrimage to the South Pole on Jan. 6, 2015.
The journey is the main focus of the documentary but he said through flashbacks the film also shows different aspects of his life and what led him to make the trek.
“People often ask me what I thought about when I was skiing for nine hours a day in the middle of nowhere,” he said.
“I talk about listening to music and audio books and then just letting my mind wander and where it went. And that’s the flashback scene where it goes back to my life earlier, when my daughter was very young and then into mountaineering and adventures and disasters on mountains where people died and cycling and other people,” he explained.
It’s through these flashbacks Evans said he could tell the story that he can’t tell during his speaking engagements.
“When I’m speaking to a group I still talk about the build up, how I got to Antarctica, all those expeditions before and then I get into the South Pole – but they’re going to find out more about who I am,” he explained.
“I think there’s a lot more meat to it in the film so you’ll get out a lot more detail than I could possibly cover in a speech and you’ll get more of the characters involved.”
Evans shot footage while he was in Antarctica but Fergus filmmaker Kent Allison of Goad Media Group conceptualized the documentary film.
“Without his knowledge, expertise, perseverance and sense of humour we would never have got where we’re at with the film festivals and these showings,” Evans said.
“He’s done a truly fantastic job.”
Allison said as soon as he met Evans and saw the South Pole footage he was intrigued to help tell the story.
“I was looking at the footage thinking [that] this, along with his life’s journey, has a lot of legs to it,” he said.
“It can really relate on multiple levels and when I saw the footage I just thought, ‘yeah, this has definite promise.’”
It’s Allison’s hope that the film will speak to a wide audience.
“I’m a big layers-type of person so I don’t like it when a story is too spoon fed,” he said.
“I edited it together … so that the viewer would … see themselves in the actual final piece because if you edit it too tightly to his story about Antarctica fewer people would be able to relate. But as soon as you add the elements of his back story it’s that much more endearing his character becomes.”
For the Elora audience, interviews with locals appear throughout the film, helping tell Evan’s story from their perspective.
Lunatic has been entered in three film festivals under the feature documentary category, including the Grand River Film Festival from Oct. 24 to 29. It has also been nominated for best documentary at the Sunrise Film Festival in Pictou, Nova Scotia from Nov. 11 to 13.
However, the documentary’s first showing will be in Elora at the Gorge Cinema on Oct. 16 and it will return on Oct. 23.
Evans and Allison will be giving an introduction to the film and will be holding a question and answer period after the film.
“It’s a very emotional film and very sad in lots of ways and very uplifting in others,” Evans said.
“People are telling us at these film festivals we have a great story, we have a great film and it’s a really sexy location.” For more information visit http://www.ianevans.ca.
