[Transcript] An Interview with Ben Lawrence
Director of "Ithaka: A Father. A Family. A Fight for Justice".
Last month, we published this exclusive video interview with Ben Lawrence, the director of “Ithaka: A Father. A Family. A Fight for Justice.”
A moving and intimate portrayal of one father’s fight to save his son, Ithaka exposes the brutal realities of the campaign to free Julian Assange. Click here for more about the film and where to watch it.
Watch the video interview here and the trailer for the film here.
Find the transcript below:
Interview with Ben Lawrence, director of “Ithaka: A father. A family. A fight for justice”
How did you come to direct “Ithaka”?
I got involved in “Ithaka” in August of 2020, when Gabriel Shipton rang me. He proposed an idea that he wanted to make a film about Julian, his brother, that focused on their father, John Shipton. That was the premise. That was the idea of the documentary.
You've been campaigning pretty much since Julian was put into Belmarsh in 2019. John had devoted his time to traveling the world, speaking on Julian's behalf, or at least advocating for his release. Gabriel got involved when he came over and visited Julian around that time. He felt motivated to try and do something.
Gabriel's background is that he's a filmmaker and he set about trying to find a filmmaker that he could partner up with. He came across my name and we spoke in August 2020. Very quickly I was on board, I really wanted to be involved. As soon as he told me the idea of the movie, as soon as he told me who he was and that it was going to focus on this family, that we're trying to save one of their loved ones – that from a universal perspective really interested me as a storyteller or a filmmaker.
I think Gabriel and I connected on a very human level in terms of just wanting to go on this journey together. Within a month I was in London for that extradition hearing in September 2020. That's when I met Stella and John and we embarked on this journey to film them over the next six months.
Interestingly, Stella had really only come out publicly as Julian's partner and the mother of their kids six months prior to when I met her. So she was very early in her, I guess, journey of becoming a public figure. Seeing where she was then and the awareness of who she was and her public speaking and all of that, I was really fascinated to follow. Although, at that point she wasn't necessarily as involved in the documentary as she ended up being, so it was a bit uncertain. She was a bit cautious, I think, around getting involved because we really went into this documentary “Ithika” and the idea to follow John and we put a lot of energy into that.
As we got to know Stella and she, I think, became more comfortable with her position as a public speaker, a public person, and kind of stepped into the the glare of the media, we were able to chart that as well. I think that was a really wonderful balance of the two stories and the two characters, two very different people, going through this process.
What I saw from that point to now is an enormous change in the public support. An enormous change in the support from the press around the world. Enormous change from the politicians speaking out globally as well. I think it has a lot to do with the change of governments, particularly in Australia. We had a change of government, in 2022 I think. The previous government wasn't supportive of Julian and this government is openly supportive of Julian. So that has put the subject matter on the table and also allowed the press to report it and also question the government, and that's happened around the world. So I think as elections happened around the world we can see the people's voices being heard. It comes up in political debates. It comes up in election time. All of those evolutions, I think, have an opportunity for it, for the story to get out and people to understand what's at stake.
What were your initial impressions of Julian Assange’s case?
I followed it in the news and I probably became aware of Julian in 2010 when the Collateral Murder video was first published, and of Wikileaks as well. That's when it really hit my consciousness. I was pretty fascinated with what he was doing at the time. We're talking really early Internet in terms of it being a mainstream thing. YouTube was only five years old when Wikileaks hit the scene globally. That was only 12-13 years ago when I became aware of Wikileaks.
So, in that period I followed Wikileaks and Julian’s story in the news, but that's all I knew of it. I hadn't read any of the books written. I'd seen the documentaries that had been made, but it wasn't really until I got to a deeper understanding, a deep dive into making “Ithika”, that I could read about the story behind the scenes that really fascinated me as well. What was unreported, what the defense put up in the case against his extradition. Details like that. Witness testimony of the spying that went on in the embassy, as well as Julian's philosophy, the idea of why Wikileaks was created.
It was a really fascinating time for me. It fed into this fascination I had around journalism as well, which is reflected in Hearts and Bones which is one of the dramas that I made that focuses on a war photographer. So all of that was bubbling away when I was writing this other film. Then I'd had Gabriel call me five years later when I'd written a drama about that world. It just felt like a natural progression as well.
What was the process for shaping the narrative throughline of “Ithaka”?
It's a really interesting process in cutting a documentary, particularly when you have that much footage. Certainly you go in with an idea of what the premises are and that it was a father that was trying to save his son. That was the idea, that was a story we wanted to show.
I had no idea what John Shipton was like. I didn't know how much his personality was going to be in the film. When I discovered what he was like and who he was I wanted as much of that as possible to come in because I felt like John was a a gateway to understand Julian. Julian being this global figure, it was only understood through the news. To have this other portal – a proxy as his father, this really personal connection – was a wonderful way to investigate who Julian was and give audiences what may be a different understanding of who Julian is, through spending time with his father. So that really interested me.
But in terms of tackling [that type of theme and the amount of footage I'd had some experience prior, I did a documentary over seven years, and so we cut that down to an hour and a half. But it's just a very methodical process of working through, for me, what moments touch you. Some are key in terms of information, some you need for exposition, but others are just following the emotion of the story. It's a chronological process of saying “Okay, it started here and it's going to finish there”. The hardest thing is working out what the end is. But in that you can see the gaps and you can understand what the audiences need to get from A to B, and it's those little bridges that become really hard work. You work out how do you get from that scene to that scene and what the audience needs to know in order to progress.
With Julian's story that we were trying to tell as a subplot in terms of the backstory of Wikileaks and who they were and the details around the court process, that was really challenging. You had this very humanistic story of the father on the road advocating for Julian and then you had this very dry court process going on behind a wall that we couldn't see. So we relied on these cards that gave us information and then we would intersperse that with John advocating, speaking to the press, speaking to the activists, spending time with Stella and the family, the kids and the extended family.
So, the film fluctuated between what I thought was a very humanistic take and gave you enough information so that you could also get an understanding of what was going on legally. But I was far more interested in the human emotional aspect of the story. And if I could have made a film that was just John and Stella, without any other things going on, I would have loved to. But it would have, I think, confused an audience, because you need to know these things. The tragedy of the story is what was going on behind the scenes in the extradition court proceedings. So, the balance of those two things was the most challenging in trying to tell the story of “Ithika”.
How did you balance the responsibility of a director telling a story with the goals of the campaign?
It weighed on me heavily because I described it not as a campaign film but a film about a campaign. The people who I met along the way and that really touched me were the campaigners; the activists that were on the ground that would turn up in the middle of a London winter and stand outside the embassy or the courthouse and advocate for Julian, holding a sign up.
They could have been out on the street advocating for any other cause. But what really touched me was that it's these people through history that make change. The people that get out of their bed and go down on the street in person and stand there, for hours, days, weeks, months – even years on end in some of the cases of these people.
I felt John was far more connected to those people than he was to the legal team or the people in the press, or the politicians that he was speaking to as well. Many of these people have a lived experience of oppression themselves or family members who have disappeared in Latin American countries. So they understand what it means to lose their freedom.
In balancing what I thought was an advocacy piece for Julian and for his cause, I was highly aware that people were going to be aware of that going into the film. I wanted it to show what it looked like to campaign for something that you believed in that was bigger than you, and also show an opposition or a force that was more powerful than you.
There are times when you're overwhelmed. And I think that's what we saw with John in that moment – a tired old man, if he doesn't mind me calling him an old man, in his later years, who was overwhelmed by months, years, of being on the road trying to do something. The one question that I always had in the back of my mind is “How do they keep going?” What is it that makes them get up in the morning and do this? I had that for the activists and I had that in the back of my mind for John.
It's funny; we would never talk about the word hope, because it's an imperfect word. It's a word that is not sustainable in a way. So when John has a moment of reflection and says, “These years have been wasted, it’s a hopeless”… I don’t think he said it was a hopeless cause but he said “These years have been wasted. Julian's lost a decade or more now”. Julian was 50 at the time. The time that John spent advocacing for this case he lost with his daughter. That's the sacrifice.
I think that the title of the film is really important in trying to answer that question of “How do they keep going?” Because they keep going through those little moments where they connect with each other. Those phone calls that John has with Julian, where they understand and are able to connect on a human level.
When John could say to his daughter that he'll be home in a month… the sacrifice is enormous. Ultimately, the only way that they keep on going is that they understand what they're fighting for is bigger than themselves. It's a really mysterious thing, but when you see it you can see how determined these people are.
I would often talk to audiences about when they watch the film to ask themselves what they would do if they had a loved one in the same situation. Ultimately, of course, they would do what John's doing and that's what keeps him going. That's what keeps Stella going. There's something in the heart of the people who go out and stand on the street that keeps them going, because they think about the loved ones that were lost or the suffering that they themselves had suffered under some sort of oppression.
So there's a solidarity there, there's a humanity there. All of that's reflected in a very gentle way through the film. In some ways that's the quality of the film that people take away. They don't take away the advocacy, they take away the strength and the humanity and the solidarity. That's universal. They're the things I was trying to explore.
If people walk in with a position, I wanted them to open them up to the emotion of the situation. I felt that when they were in the presence of a loving family trying to fight for a loved one, in that moment they would be open to the story of Julian. So that was the first thing I wanted to do, just put them in a position where they might think of their own situation. I think that we've done that to some success in the response that we've had around the world. But it's a very, very difficult story to tell because it's so complicated. But when you boil it down to a family story, I think that's when it has its most power. Then you can see it for what it is.
How do you think we breakthrough to mainstream audiences with this issue?
I honestly think the most powerful process is a slow and gentle process. In some of the breakthroughs that have happened during the time that I've been most closely following it over the last three years, the big breakthroughs have happened with the most unexpected meetings or coincidences or connections of people.
One example that comes to mind is when the New York Times and The Guardian, El Pais and Le Monde all got together. This was only a few months ago, they published a letter in support of Julian. That was incredible. I don't know how that came about, but it was something that really affected and kind of pinpointed in piece the mainstream and I think pushed it into people's consciousness.
Up until that point, there'd been a lot of coverage, but it hadn't been within those mainstream outlets. What that did was, I think, it gave the permission for those larger kind of TV network outlets to then report on that. So it just kind of spread. But I think it was through years of gentle advocacy; one person to another, talking to another. I think that's how effective change happens.
I saw John in an interview when the US pulled out of the Afghanistan war which was, I think, the longest war that America's been involved in and I think it's certainly the longest war Australia has been involved in. What John said is that the revelations that Wikileaks published finally had an effect. The illegality of that war, the tragedy of that war. The mysterious nature is that no one knew what anyone was doing there. The damage, the toll it took on that country, still wasn't enough for the Western forces to pull out.
But the revelations that Wikileaks made slowly worked their way into the consciousness of the population and then eventually overwhelming, I think, the politicians themselves. Eventually they kind of had to pull out. But it was over a slow period of two decades that that mindset took to get into the population.
I think it's the same thing with Julian; there's been so much opposition to him, such an effective campaign against him, that the counter to that takes a long time to seep in. I think it really is people talking to their friends and loved ones and family and colleagues about the issue. I think it's people getting out and marching. I think it's people doing interviews. I think it is a slow process. I confidently believe that things don't change until they do. And it seems like then at that point, they change overnight. But when Julian is free, it will seem like the last decade or so of campaigning to free him just happens all of a sudden.
I feel that change coming and it's all heading in the right direction, because the last three years I've only seen it grow. Like I said, there's going to be periods like in the last week with this decision, but there's a push back. The overwhelming force is with the people and I think it's growing. I think that is the thing that'll make the change. It is the people just advocating, calling their politicians. All of those campaigns that are going on, people wearing t-shirts, all that sort of stuff. It is making a change, I think, and it is working. But it's just a slow process, but things that last forever take a long time to build.
In my mind it's the movement that Julian started that will free him ultimately. Because when you speak to people about the work that he did in the publications he made, that is the thing that they all believe in and the principles upon which Wikileaks was built. That's the thing that people connect on.
The support for Julian is across all spectrums of politics. It's the one issue that unites everyone. That in of itself, I think, is a really important thing. You can disagree on a whole bunch of things, but Julian and his work… people can agree on that he's done remarkable things. I think history will judge that. So I think we're heading in the right direction. Just slow, slow goings ometimes.
How do you message the significance of Julian’s case to the wider public?
It's really hard because I talk to people in the US and the whole thing's a free press thing and it's the First Amendment. You talk to people in Australia and it's he's an Australian citizen. You talk to people in Latin America and… the one thing I would say is that there isn't a country that hasn't been touched by the work of Wikileaks.
Arguably, Julian is the most famous Australian in the world. The other one, ironically, is probably Rupert Murdoch. But the publications have touched every country in some form or fashion and it has probably revealed something about the way that country works, which is help the people of the populous in some in some way.
But I think it's different in different places. I think probably the hardest country… I mean, we got more pushback in America from the press in terms of the coverage of Ithika in Variety, in New York Times and all that. European outlets were far more supportive and I think Australian press a lot more positively received the film. When I say they positively received the film, they receive the story of Julian more positively as well, because I put them together.
If I had to condense what I think… I don't know, it's so different everywhere. I mean, the right to know and the free press, I don't think anyone can argue against that. People understand the stakes and the precedents that this sets as well.
In you mentioning the multipolar world and the shift to that, I think that the shift that's going on there is really interesting. I think that most of the Global South are far more in support and far more aware of Wikileaks and Julian's work. It's desperate times for America, I think, because they're saying they're declining power. So when you see the rise of the global South, I think it’s real opportunities for things like transparency and free press to be on the front of the agenda. Because the truth of what's really going on is always going to be far more important for us to make decisions about probably the biggest political shift that's happened in a century or more.
So I think those times are coming and those discussions will start to happen more and more. But as they do, I think the desperation by which the traditional powers are hanging on in the world will also amp up as well. So it's a really critical time. But I think you're seeing protests everywhere around the world and change of governments and what is always on the agenda or on the front of the agenda is a free press. So that battle's going on everywhere and I think Julian's at the center of a lot of it.
How do we make and measure progress in such a purposefully long and punishing process?
Watching John and Gabriel campaign and all the campaigners around the world, they really work the opportunities. And I think if there's an opportunity in front of them, that's the avenue that will go. Hitting your head up against some other idea that you might have, and it's not getting any traction, is wasted energy.
I think that in terms of a sustainable position on being an activist, if you're getting feedback from progress that's what will sustain you. Whether or not it's the most effective avenue you don't know, because it's such a big thing. But if you are getting feedback that you're getting, either more signatories to something or you're getting more meetings with politicians, you're getting more press time… I mean, any measurable thing. If you can work an avenue, I think that's where the activists benefit from focusing their attention and I can see that that is what John and Gabriel are doing .
But when you look at like when the group of US politicians signed the letter, that was a huge breakthrough. I don't know how that happened. But that's probably the biggest breakthrough that they've had in the US. But they answer to their constituents, and there is a feedback loop with their constituents so that their constituents like AOC’s [Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez] and the others, they would see that they signed that. And the ones that weren't on board would be curious as to why and then they start looking into the issue. But there has been, I think, a concerted effort by their constituents. They must poll those that their constituents to find out if they're in support of Julian and if they are, why? They're probably thinking free press, they’re thinking free First Amendment. But they also have motives in of themselves.
I'm sure politicians have made this a point because it benefits them. But it benefits them because their constituents vote for them and they think that they can get some traction in the press. So there's all these different motivations going on, but the avenues of opportunity for the campaign are being worked because those opportunities are revealing themselves. So you can have five things going on, one of them pays off and you think “Okay, I'm going to keep working that”.
The other thing that I find really interesting that's going on is previous campaigns, that Julian's campaign can measure itself against, like that of Daniel Ellsberg, looking at how he shifted the public narrative. He was in a very similar position with the Pentagon Papers and had a smear campaign against him and all of those aspects. When you look historically, now you look at where Daniel Ellsberg sits in the mythology of the American culture. It's a very different position to where he was when he first released it [the Pentagon Papers] and he was up against the president, he was up against the CIA – very, very similar kind of opponents that Julian has.
I don't have any answers there, but I think that if you see good feedback, if you see good results, then that will keep working those avenues. I would say to anyone that's probably the best advice I would give because I've seen it work. On the same front, I've also seen where people think they have a great idea to work in a campaign and they're not getting any results. They're not getting any traction. They're not getting whatever they think that they might want to get out of it. They become exhausted and they become hopeless and despondent. So I think it is a sustainability thing and I think it also is a way of measuring how successful the work is, the campaign is, the messaging is, etc. etc…
What was most unexpected and surprising about making this film?
It's totally changed my life. It's totally changed my understanding of how, the news works. It's changed my understanding of the political relationships that our countries have with each other, between Australia's allies, etc.. and how decisions are made on a political level. I think that there's a lot at stake here for the everyday people. I wish people understood that. Trying to pull away some of the complexity of the issue is really hard.
What surprised me the most… The whole journey has been just a kind of a really interesting, enlightening thing, but I think it's the people that I met along the way… Like I said earlier, speaking to the people on the street, hearing their stories, why they were there, hearing their stories of oppression of themselves or their families, the countries they come from… that really touched me. It made me understand what it means when our freedoms are lost. Because it's a really abstract thing for most people in the West to understand that, because they haven't experienced it.
Actually when we met Ai Weiwei and he came down to the court to show his support of Julian, one thing he said that I thought was really interesting was that he said that the fight is the thing. In the fight there is meaning. Because in this kind of long period in which people are trying to affect the world, it is in that action of fighting where the understanding comes from as to what it actually is that we are doing, what are we actually fighting for? It is the purpose, it is that struggle that is the purpose.
So I kind of take strength from that and it's sustaining and there is a tiny little bit of hope in there that what you're doing is what you're meant to be doing. Ultimately the destination is not the thing, but it's the fight that you're in now that is more meaningful.
Can you explain how this case relates to the First Amendment?
Going back to Julian and Wikileaks, I think that he was very critical of the countries that he loved the most in terms of the ones he knew the most. He was critical of Australia. He admired the First Amendment and the Bill of Rights and all that, as so many countries do because they're such remarkable documents.
I held them to that, and I think what's happening now with Julian is that because America seems so hypocritical by targeting Julian, that all the other countries now can hold him up as an example of what then they can suppress other journalists. So no one's held to higher ideals anymore, even the ones that have these incredible documents. So, that's where the whole system falls down when you have that level of hypocrisy. I think other countries just are fed up with that and I think that's part of where you get that division around the world and not even mentioning the last 200 years.
This interview was edited for clarity by a supporter in our activist community.
If you’d like to volunteer to make a strategic contribution to Stella Assange‘ campaign with your specific skillset, please send an email to SAInstateam@proton.me with a short presentation of your expertise (or link to bio), why you want to join and what you think you could contribute with, and we’ll take it from there. Many thanks 🙏🏼
Watch the full interview here:
Watch the trailer here: