by MATTHEW HAYS

Winnipeg-based filmmaker John Paskievich says those who stutter are faced with a cruel catch-22. When they begin to speak to people, they try desperately not to stutter. But this effort invariably causes them to stutter even more. The result is a cycle, which can lead to stutterers becoming so self-conscious that they simply withdraw and rarely engage socially.

Such scenarios are the stuff of Paskievich’s latest NFB documentary feature, Unspeakable. In it, Paskievich interviews a broad spectrum of those who stutter, explores various treatments and therapies for stuttering, visits a stuttering convention and even captures a stuttering rapper in action. Paskievich agrees when I call it the first stuttering pride movie.

And Unspeakable, as it turns out, is a deeply personal film, perhaps the most personal for the filmmaker behind such fascinating docs as If Only I Were an Indian (his ’96 entry about Czechs who imitate North American aboriginal lifestyles) and The Gypsies of Svinia (his unblinking ’98 feature that captured the impoverished lives of European gypsies). That’s because Paskievich stutters himself.

The idea to make a stuttering movie came in 2002, when Paskievich crossed the country with an accompanying retrospective of his documentary work. The tour was matched by an obligatory string of media appearances, and Paskievich found himself infantilized by radio and TV interviewers who continually asked him for “just one more take” after he would stutter through the answer to a question.

The experience was humiliating—Paskievich includes some of the excruciating interview footage here—and Paskievich says the entire experience was emotionally draining. “The problem really isn’t with the stutterer,” explains Paskievich. “The problem is with the listener: how will they respond? It’s a question those who stutter have to deal with all the time. Then they try not to stutter, which just makes things worse. A stutterer is like an artist who always wants to be liked, wondering what the critic will say when they’re done.”

Fear and self-loathing

Unspeakable, as it turns out, is a fine bit of doc filmmaking, offering a great deal of information while revealing the filmmaker’s deeply personal stake in it. We meet Paskievich’s wife and son, who convey their feelings about Paskievich’s stuttering and his attitudes towards it. Paskievich attempts a series of therapies intended to reduce stuttering, but finds ultimately that most of them aren’t necessarily all that effective.

What Paskievich did discover as a result of the filmmaking process was that he was still carrying a great deal of self-loathing due to his stuttering. The toughest part of making the film, he reports, was watching himself on screen, stuttering through various sentences. “I realized how much I disliked that aspect of myself. I felt a sense of shame. At the same time, I knew all along that that sense of shame was wrong.”

But perhaps most brutal for the viewer will be Paskievich’s interviews with children who stutter, and adults who recall how teachers dealt with their stuttering when they were young. It is the sheer vulnerability of some very young children incapable of communicating without extreme effort and discomfort that makes parts of Unspeakable almost unbearable.

“A lot of speech pathologists know nothing about stuttering, and are not required to learn anything about it,” says Paskievich, who points to stats that suggest that about one per cent of the population stutters. “And teachers often really don’t understand how to respond when they’re faced with it in a child. Parents and children are promised therapy, but it’s often token therapy. They think they will be helped, but only will be in very rare cases. The kids are often in for a major letdown.”

Paskievich also manages to capture the reactions that those who stutter often receive. Employing a hidden camera, Paskievich asks people on the street how to get to Chinatown, stutter intact. Most walk by, either with expressions of revulsion or with a blank face.

But perhaps most intriguing is the identity which has sprung up around those who stutter, similar to the way identities and communities have formed around the deaf and gays. Those who attend the stuttering convention in Nashville attain a high by being around others who they don’t have to explain themselves to. “I grew up thinking I was alone,” recalls Paskievich. “The greatest thing for those who attended the convention was to see that they weren’t alone at all, and that there are many who have similar experiences.”

Unspeakable premieres as part of the world film festival. For screening times and ticket info see www.ffm-montreal.org

>> Movie Listings