Synopsis
Revered as “one of this country’s greatest living poets,” Lionel Fogarty didn’t learn to read or write until his early 20s. Since then, for the past five decades he has weaponised the tools and language of his coloniser for his poetical means.
A prolific documentarian, Lionel shares this radical and bewildering poetry and video archive in a collaborative film with his friends. Together they illustrate an intricate and fragile world of personal and political resistance, simultaneously uplifting the community around him in his own poetic vision. Yours In Struggle uncovers a living archive of Aboriginal literature and activism, guided and led by Lionel’s own words and images it reveals a complex and formidable man who has been writing and filming in obsessive fury for 50 years.
As a mosaic mirror to his own poetry, Lionel instructs his collaborators to piece together 200 hours of unseen footage while he packs up his home on Muninjali country. He’s been evicted again. Meanwhile, Lionel’s commitment to relentless activism is the inseparable story of his writing, manifesting as radical citizen journalism through poetics and guerrilla storytelling. He is forever with a camera, pen, or megaphone in hand.
An implacable political activist and award winning author of more than 15 books, Lionel’s rise as a warrior of Aboriginal resistance is pitted against the historical backdrop of Joh Bjelke-Petersen’s police state in Queensland. Together we uncover an alternative history of Black activism in the 70s and 80s through the lens of one of its foremost and persistent voices, and those that left a mark on his life along the way; Cheryl Buchanen, Dennis Walker, Gary Foley, Ali Cobby-Ekkerman, Oodgeroo Noonucal and more.
For Lionel, the personal and the political have no boundaries.
Director
Lionel Fogarty in collaboration with producers Mia Tinkler, Charlie Freedman & Alex Vella-Horne
Story
Yours in struggle invites you into a personal and political history largely untold. Set across different locations and time planes, somewhere between Lionel’s beloved weatherboard shack; his “yellow submarine” in south-east regional Queensland and Lionel’s extensive video archive, the documentary weaves a story across time; mirroring Lionel’s mosaic poetic voice.
At only 14 years old, Lionel escapes Cherbourg Aboriginal Reserve, widely considered the harshest of missions under Joh Bjelke-Petersen’s regime, to find a thriving black activist community in Brisbane. He soon receives charges for conspiring against the state alongside his contemporary, Dennis Walker, and Lionel finds himself in Boggo Road prison at age 16 where he is radicalised with Black politics. Lionels charges are dropped due to a campaign led by trailblazing Aboriginal activist, Cheryl Buchanen, whose lasting impression on Lionel’s life and poetry is profound. They are partners in love and politics, co-parenting five children together. Unable to read or write, Lionel is gifted a dictionary and a Maoist book of poetry from Cheryl. She goes on to open up the first Black owned publishing house in Queensland, and Lionels poetry career begins.
Everything changes when Lionel’s little brother, Daniel Yock, is killed in police custody. Lionel and Cheryl’s relationship has simultaenously eroded, and the anger inside of him takes a lifetime to heal. As his friends (and filmmakers) help him pack up his weatherboard home, aged 67 and evicted from yet another house on his own Mununjali country, he shares his story.
This is not a traditional biopic. It is not a story just about one man, but about the community that makes each other, the radical Aboriginal leaders of Brisbane Black Activism and Black First Nations Poetry. It is a film about the violence of a colony, and the creativity and resistance that survives despite of it.
Production Stage
- Development
- Production
- Post-production
- Completed
- Outreach
DURATION: 80 MINUTES
Issue area
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