Solas Boru – Interview with Nathan Slattery

On a rare occurrence I get to cover a film during production, I take it. I get those every once in a while, and the results are always mixed on where these productions go, but it’s always worthwhile. This one in particular has been in production for well over 2 1/2 years, having a cast so large it puts movies like Flick’s Chicks and The List to shame. Not that those were any good to begin with anyway.

Some of this concept was partially inspired by Nathan’s family name, Slattery. When Nathan was young, before he’d go to school, he’d look up on the wall and it had the family crest. It featured the Slattery’s coat of arms where the text read, Dal gCais and featured 3 lion-like creatures and a helmet. The 3 lions were meant as ‘Strong’ in the Slattery name, and Slattery’s have a connection to the bloodline of Dalcassians (who also have some association with Irish king Brian Boru). Nathan thought about that while he was homesick in Canada, and when his Christian brother schoolfriend Benny McCabe in Ireland told him how he would like to spend a day with him, Nathan wondered what they could do together. When he returned to Ireland in 2019, he came up with the concept as a short, where he went to Drombeg stone circle for the first day of shooting, and then Glenquin castle on the 2nd day. The 2nd day featured the assassination of Brian Boru which took place on April 23, 1014. As the COVID pandemic arose, the film went dormant, and Nathan decided to extend the story by adding more stories, getting inspiration from a conversation he had with his father Cornelius at the Drombeg stone circle. It started out as a simple short film, but became more the past couple years as Nathan found and recruited actors and people he knew in general. 

So how does the short film tie into the rest of what’s being made? In the original, Nathan’s character of Brian drops a stone into a stone circle, and thanks to the fun trick we refer to as reversing of a clip in editing software, the rock boomerangs back from Brian’s father Cinnetig Mac Lorcain in the 10th century. After all, that stone could be a crown’s future jewel, or the load bearing cornerstone of King Brian Boru’s castle. The film continues in a mystical magical place AKA Gates Lake in Pemberton. Other locations included Dog Mountain on Cypress Hill, Mission, and some upcoming locations in Ireland for the next couple of months. But it’s not just about the locations, it’s also about the historical accuracy as Nathan did a lot of research on ol’ Brian and the Dalcassian clan, but at the same time keeping his own unique style of filming mixed with the history lessons to make it creative around the budget. Nathan is First Nations Irish, so his goal with this film is to preserve the Irish language. 

The feature will be divided into 4 segments: Bas Boru which is all about the assassination and the stone returning from the time transfer, Solas Boru which is about Brian as a brave warrior who meets his family one final time shortly after he dies and goes to heaven, Bhflaithais Boru where he finally makes it to heaven and goes further on where he morphs into another person and we explore the possibility of what if Brian Boru had a twin brother, finally ending with Neamhbhasmhar Boru which shows consequence when the twin brother becomes immortal for eternity. It references how things are going in Ireland currently what with turmoil that’s still going on even after a millennia ago. I think we can all relate since turmoil is happening all over the world right now.

I got a load of historical information on Brian Boru in the beginning, maybe a little too much, but you’ll learn everything I did when the movie comes out. Not only do we get a history lesson from Ireland, we get multiple languages throughout the film, like English, Latin, German, French, Russian, even some Japanese. It’s a history lesson for sure, now let’s learn about what went into filming this production, as well as some other details about this guy who I apparently haven’t spoken enough about already. 

HNMAG: Let’s get into the fact that this is being filmed in so many places like Cypress Mountain, and a castle in Ireland. How can you balance heading out to do so many locations?

Nathan Slattery: It’s crazy, isn’t it? To me, it’s kind of by a way by divine application. I felt the place, I’ve been to all these places for the first time in years in Canada, so I knew these places without even looking for them. In a lot of locations, you know there are people everywhere. Just the other day when we were filming, there were strange sounds. Tennis balls, helicopters, plane lines, and the concert tune up. It’s just beautiful places like San Joseph Bay where there’s stone stacks and waterfalls and beaches. All the beaches I’ve been in the world, there’s no place like it, it’s the Gold River National Park. I went to do a scene with a hawk there, there’s also scenes of bluff mountains, caverns in Squamish and Pemberton waterfall. I’m thrilled with locations, and the locations have been phenomenal. I’m an outdoorsman myself.

 

HNMAG: And how do you choose where to go? Is there a location scouting process?

Nathan Slattery: It just comes up from being a stonemason, doing work in organic farms, planting, and the first 14 years here in Canada. I knew these places already, they were like places in my mind, what was 2 days of filming has become nearly 200 days. 

 

HNMAG: What about balancing out this and your personal life? How do you keep the two separate and work them out? It seems like a difficult task.

Nathan Slattery: It is because people sometimes may not be available, and then they change on the day, or weather and stuff like that. However in 2019, 2 days I was lucky and it always just seemed to work out with the actors. I took a break in ’19 because I had been thinking too much with other projects coming up.

 

HNMAG: Before this was Solas Boru, it was originally something else called Bas Boru. What was the reason for extending/changing the concept?

Nathan Slattery: It was supposed to be edited by other editors, but too much footage. Now Bas Boru has been edited by Bijan Karim and his partner Inanna Cusi, it was fun editing that. In 2020, I didn’t do anything so there was a break for 2022, and for me, organizing it is that I try to get my homework down. I have to find the actors, bring their costume up, and some actors took a whole year before they were ready. It’s been kind of 5 years really, but with a 2 year break which was meant to be short. I didn’t decide for this to be a feature, it just happened. It’s my golf, it’s my outing, my socializing, it’s like going to the bar. It’s all coming together like Biopsy Shake. 

 

HNMAG: Bas Boru was nearly finished with some flaws. Just how do you find who to edit these projects and expect them to finish it?

Nathan Slattery: We have Carl Craig who I met in Vancouver maybe 7 years ago, he’s onto the colour correction and audio this winter. I met Bijan and Inanna at Black Cat video as he talked about editing, and he started editing what was meant to be a short a few months later. There’s been over 55 characters since and even I can’t believe it. It’s just amazing. There’s a lot to be done, but it’s going to be 2 hours practically in film. 

 

HNMAG: It seems the number of cast is a rather big number featuring both talent from Ireland and Canada. Isn’t it extravagant to have such an amount of people?

Nathan Slattery: It is, but again that’s just the way it happened. It is and it isn’t, because it moves fast. It’s kind of Brian Boru going through the journey of his time maybe from when he was in his 30’s to maybe 70’s. However that’s going to come across I don’t know, as I said with the over 55 at the moment, it’s probably going to be up to near hundred. It’s exciting for me. Not that I wanted to audition people, I knew people, when you meet people you know them. But to have that many cast makes it exciting. You’ve got 10 bounty hunters, 12 kings, 10 brothers, 4 wives, and that’s halfway there. Then you’ve got the mother, father, the children, you have battle scenes and I suppose there’s other women as well like high priestess women.

Cast members included Moshe Mastai who played Brain Boru’s grandfather, Mike Nakatsu who played an archer/Boru’s nemesis, Mehlinda Heartt taking on the role of a harpist, and a lot of people including Alan Duprat, Susan Arum, Spencer Bradley Hutchins, Deborah E Ellingson, Byron Sheardown, and Michael Foreman among many more that Nathan knew in his 13 years of being here. They all come from different cultural backgrounds even. If anyone is wondering, I’m not one of those people. Otherwise this article wouldn’t exist since I don’t do coverage on my own acting roles. But someone who shines really brightly in this is Vancouver’s own Mackenzie Grey narrating voiceover sections throughout the film to let the audience know what is going on. It’ll add more depth and make it amazing to have someone like him provide the voice. 

 

HNMAG: It seems unorthodox to bring in people you’ve known a while instead of just trying a casting call. Why don’t you ever do casting calls?

Nathan Slattery: Casting calls are kind of unfair, film wise, and it’s kind of promoting it too much. I like to go organic, kind of fluid and its worked out beautiful. To say this person’s not an actor, we’re all actors. The whole world’s a stage. 

 

HNMAG: With all cast on an honorarium in a film shot mostly on a phone, how do you make it something worthwhile for them if the possibility of it not being finished?

Nathan Slattery: What actors get out of this, they get tools themselves. Everybody’s being paid in a directorial way/cultural sense, then what we’ll do is bring it to the festivals. I might get some kind of sponsorship or put in my own money into festival submissions globally. There’s people that I know that are very good with festivals and putting it in. I have a story to put out, I don’t know if it’s accepted but, to me what’s put together has me excited. My timeline is it’ll be finished by pre-Fall, October of 2025 if not August.

 

HNMAG: Judging by your film resume, it sounds like you’re pushing yourself with assortments of projects. Don’t you think you should limit yourself?

Nathan Slattery: I’ve taken it slow, it’s been 5 years for this project, and there was 1 in 2018 (St. Playtrix Day) and 4H was 2020 and 21. I don’t even think about doing anything from 2007-2017. I took a break from being burnt out with theatre and film to focus more on traditional Irish stonemasonry, as Danny Day Lewis took up shoemaking. Biopsy Shake was finished and it’s about getting a good team of people together as well. We got another editor now for the music and it’s there. It always comes through divine application. You just meet people and I go by that. I’d rather go to antique auctions, I have enough auditions that I didn’t get here.

 

 

Not to mention, some actors dropped out because this just wasn’t for them. Nathan counted about 5 in total. Most of Nathan’s talent tends to be people with some  experience, because he loves to give even more experiences to fresh talent and new names. He started getting back into detail about how this was shot completely on an android phone and an iPhone, so I had to pressure for another answer regarding cinematography.

 

HNMAG: And why did you choose to shoot this all on mobile phones?

Nathan Slattery: Because for me, the sound quality came up, and I’ve always been filming since I worked my actors studio in 2001 to 2008. I’ve been operating different cameras. If you look at the movie, Tangerine, it was all filmed on a mobile phone so this LG Velvet had a market value of $2000 and I paid for the hardware about $100 monthly. It fell into icy water, during the lake scene, and I was lucky that a really good friend of mine was able to retrieve the information on the chip. Then I got 4K on this Iphone here, and it’s kind of user-friendly. It’s something new for me, and you don’t get much attention from people when you’re getting locations really out. You’ve been lucky enough that way. It’s something that is unique in itself. Everybody is recording with mobile phones, but to me, film is moving art.

 

HNMAG: Communication and keeping track of calls is a primary responsibility in film work. It helps to build connections, and find people to work with. How have you manifested the patience of putting up with all that despite your introverted traits at times?

Nathan Slattery: I just keep in touch with Messenger or just on Facebook there then they see what’s happening from scene to scene over the months. All I can be is myself. They’ve been really genuine, really helpful and a lot of the women had their own costumes. They were great. It’s usually the people that really want it. You get a feeling what people are like, they will just kind of want, and see. You get a general idea and some are shy, and say they won’t be able to do it. I’ll kind of push a little somewhat and then they’ll be delighted in that. It’s one thing talking about something, some people say the Irish have the gift of the gab. When they said that, I thought about it and went, “Hm. I might turn that around. Get people thinking on the philosophy on it, shift the slab.” Shift of the slab, meaning the movement of the slab. Build it, put it down at the same time, finish it and show. Rome wasn’t built in a day.

 

HNMAG: Back to recruiting actors, do you just reach out to them at random?

Nathan Slattery: What happens is people come to me, they’d like a role in a film, and I’ll always stick with somebody and be loyal to them. I actually know them for years, for the film I knew karate instructor Wim Tewinkel for years. He wanted to work in film for a long time. Jimmy James always wanted to do a role with me. Some people like John Keinanen, I kind of knew him, Robert Stevens directed me in a radio play, Tralee Dunn when I saw her Irish dancing.

 

HNMAG: Also as of recently, you got a pre-cancer mole removed from your body. How do you push yourself to keep going after what sounded like an intense operation? 

Nathan Slattery: Yeah, it was kind of scary. Didn’t expect that one to come in when I’m already coeliac. There are hidden cancers in ourselves. It goes with the age territory. I remember being all stitched up, and I said I’d go back into stonemasonry as the project had to be finished. I left them in too long and the nurse that looked at it missed two of them and so they’d been in for another couple of weeks. I found them itchy but it was sore having to get them out. I still kept going just to breathe in the pain, and I have to keep going because time is short. You never know what’s around the next corner and you can curl up into a ball or get out and up at ‘em. People would suggest something or push you on in your career, but those very same people step on your cape. ‘Grip of Arm, Granite Charm’

 

 

Nathan has made himself clear, and while his IMDB states he’s an actor and director, he doesn’t call himself such. He prefers to be known as a ‘bespoke artisan’ of some sort. What kind of sort? Most likely the beyond interesting sort. He wants to create something for all of us and time wise it may turn out more interesting than ever. Now as Nathan makes his way through Ireland, he continues to shoot some more scenes where he continues to add his artistic flair to the ancient history of Brian Boru. One scene he has in mind is Boru himself breaking up a battle between two different sides. But it could be converted to something as simple as him halting a tug o’war or a random wrestling match or maybe guys throwing runes at each other. Who knows what he’ll end up making? I certainly don’t but it is sure to astound audiences in both Ireland and Canada, whether they watch behind the scenes, or later on when it hits the festivals.