Darby Duffin and Adam Jones are the directors-producers of Fish & Men, an award-winning documentary recently released on Apple and Amazon that reveals how consumer demand drives an irrational global seafood trade that threatens local fishing communities and public health.
Living in coastal New Hampshire in 2012, I had an unexpected conversation with the wife of a local fisherman. It was through this chance meeting that I first became aware of the grim plight of New England’s centuries-old fishing communities, which led me to the discover how this once iconic and proud American trade had devolved into a slow, quiet death spiral while America was importing about 90% of its seafood. Worse, no one seemed to notice.
In early 2013, when I became aware of a documentary film contest and reality TV show, I developed this story concept to pitch. The winner would get $250,000 to make the film and distribution through Vince Vaughn’s production company. I ended up as a finalist out of 5,000 submissions, which validated the story as a proof of concept – but no deal. As it would later turn out, $250,000 wouldn’t be nearly enough to make our film a reality.
After pitching a handful of other producers, it didn’t take long to discover that getting financing for an independent documentary was nearly impossible – especially for a first-time filmmaker. Finally, I reached out to an old college buddy, Adam Jones, who was a commercial director. I pitched him the idea over lunch, and we left two hours later as partners.
The Journey Begins
Adam had been directing commercials for 20 years, and produced a few narrative shorts and a web series. Given his background, he initially figured, this project wouldn’t be that different. But the next six years would prove to be the most difficult of our lives, professionally.
Our vision was to make a film chronicling the current struggles of the American fisherman competing in a globalized seafood economy. Gloucester, Massachusetts — a 400-year-old fishing town familiar to anyone who saw The Perfect Storm or the more recent CODA — became the starting point of production. It was a cinematic location at the epicenter of the economic crisis in the commercial fishing industry.
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The next step was finding our characters. A handful of fishermen were consistently quoted in the media, but neither I nor my partner had any direct connection to Gloucester — a community notoriously insulated and suspicious of outsiders – especially documentary filmmakers! Gloucester had been burned too many times in the past.
People have said that making a doc is wholly dependent on access. But access is dependent on trust. Building trust over a couple of years was essential. I cold-called one fisherman and told him about our project. He invited me to coffee. After an hour, we had secured his participation, and two weeks later, he became our first interview and one of our main characters. This first contact became the linchpin to establishing our credibility in the community, and opening doors to other key individuals in Gloucester.
Discovery and Creative Choices
We knew we wanted to connect the dots between the dire situation of our fishermen back to a globalized seafood industry that was importing all this foreign seafood. But there were a lot of complex factors contributing to the situation – government regulations, environmental changes, economic policies, et cetera. Our challenge was to identify and sift through them, and decide how to present them.
From the outset, we knew that we didn’t want to make an advocacy film. We didn’t want to manipulate the audience into reaching a pre-ordained conclusion that fit an agenda. Rather, we took an objective approach to the subject matter and let the discovery process determine where the story would go. Our challenge was to unravel a lot of scientific information and contradictory viewpoints and present them in an authentic and compelling way that depicted the humanity of our fishermen while also conveying the essential complexities of the situation.
As we assembled the story, we were confronted with a lot of creative choices in which we didn’t always agree —a challenge of having two directors. Where is the story ultimately going? What are the conflicts? Who (or what) is the antagonist? Struggling with these questions took time and more than a few heated conversations.
There was a temptation to present certain characters as villains. But we resisted this urge to stay true to our guiding vision, which was the let the audience decide. We abide by classic story structure in the presentation of certain characters, but all are given the opportunity to make their cases.
Desperately Seeking Solutions
Another guideline that we knew we needed to follow was to offer some viable solutions for the problems that we would present. If all our film had to offer was a series of dire situations and bleak scenarios for the future, it wouldn’t make for a very compelling film. We didn’t want to leave our audience feeling depressed and helpless. We wanted to empower viewers with new information that would spark conversation and inspire change.
But: If the industry we were documenting hadn’t found any solutions to the many challenges, how were two filmmakers going to discover the answer?
This was arguably the most difficult challenge we faced. We needed to identify characters confronting this vast problem. Unsurprisingly, this took some time. We got lost down more than a few rabbit holes.
During this time, now a couple years into production, we became aware of at least two other productions covering similar topics and shooting in our locations. This meant others might be the first to tell this story, and perhaps secure a distribution deal. Would our film be dismissed if we didn’t cross the finish line first? Ultimately, we chose to focus on making our film the best it could be.
We eventually found our unicorn – a trailblazing entrepreneur pioneering a sustainability movement. This missing link provided the final pieces we needed to tell our story. But little did we know that the final phase of our journey would push us to the brink.
The Cut
We started to assemble a cut about a year into shooting. Ideally, we would’ve begun the edit earlier. But, as with most docs, finances were always stretched thin, and finding a talented, available and affordable editor proved difficult. We had no choice but to do it piecemeal, passing the project through four editors, until we had what we thought was a solid rough cut.
The time had come to begin submitting to festivals.
The only problem was that we didn’t realize that the film wasn’t ready. We were feeling the pressure (and exhaustion) of working on the project for four years. Understandably, we wanted it done and out there! But, after our initial submissions to top-tier festivals ended in rejections, we had a call with a seasoned doc filmmaker who urged us to host a private screening. He had already warned us not to begin the festival submissions until we had taken this critical step. We were about to find out how right he was.
We screened the film to a group of 15-20 friends in L.A., many of whom were editors and directors. The post-screening conversation was more than enlightening. There were positive comments. But there were more than a few observations and critiques – and even a suggestion that we go back out and shoot more.
It’s a Wrap!
We had a lot more work to do. This painful reality was undoubtedly the low point for us. Adam even briefly contemplated walking off the project. I wouldn’t have blamed him if he had, but we were both in too deep to give up.
After a couple weeks, we regrouped and began our search for a new editor. Thankfully, we found Heidi Zimmerman, an editor crazy enough to embrace our monstrosity of footage. We also hired a story consultant and consulting editor. Their fresh eyes gave us the critical perspective we needed to rediscover and restructure our film. It would take another 18 months of hard work and collaboration with our editor to refine the storyline.
After six long years, we premiered the film at the New Hampshire Film Festival, where we won the Audience Award. But the pandemic arrived just days before our second festival screening. Despite COVID-19, our film has screened at more than 40 festivals and won 11 awards – most recently the Jury Award at the 2021 Berkshire International Film Festival.
Making this film required more perseverance, patience and sacrifice than we’d ever imagined. From operating a camera with frozen fingers on the deck of a boat in January to organizing 50 shoots in multiple countries to managing multiple crowdfunding campaigns to help fill the financing gap – this film extracted every ounce of ingenuity, energy and adaptability that we could muster.
In the end, Adam and I had to finance 50 percent of the budget ourselves – a not-so-small detail, as our wives often remind us. We were fortunate to have had so many people offer their time, talent and wisdom along the way. There are too many names to list, but without them, we would never have made it to the finish line.
I am proud of the film we made and believe it captures the authenticity of Gloucester and its proud fishing community. The subjects of our film represent thousands of fishermen in coastal communities down the Atlantic shores to the Gulf of Mexico and up the Pacific Coast.
My hope is that this film will spark a long-overdue national dialogue about the health and economic risks of importing so much of our seafood from largely unregulated foreign sources. I will consider our film a success if it can inspire viewers to begin asking where their seafood comes from, seek out local, seasonal fish, and consider trying new species. The survival of one of America’s oldest and most essential industries may very well depend on it.
Main image: A still from Fish and Men, now available on VOD.
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