Surviving Earth is based on the true story of Vladimir Gajić, and centres on his life after arriving in the UK in the 1990s, having fled the conflict in the former Yugoslavia. Set in Bristol in 2015, the story focuses on Vlad’ s life post-rehab, his relationship with his daughter, and his role as a drugs worker while also pursuing success with his Balkan band, Fuzia. The film has a particular resonance to BDP in that its lead characters, Vlad, Duncan and Misko, were group workers there for many years.
Slavko Sobin’ s portrayal of Vlad... captures the charm of someone who inspires love and loyalty despite repeatedly inflicting damage on those closest to him.
written from my point of view, but I had to figure out whose is the most interesting perspective to tell it from because if it was the daughter’ s, it would’ ve missed a lot of Vlad’ s story.’
The reality of drug use is rarely portrayed well on the big screen, it being much easier to resort to stereotypes and black and white thinking. Slavko Sobin’ s portrayal of Vlad is a welcome respite from this – he manages to capture the charm of someone who inspires love and loyalty despite repeatedly inflicting damage on those closest to him.
‘ It’ s a full-bodied role with this amazing range of things that you need to show and live through,’ he says.‘ And it’ s an important story because it talks about healing and friendship and humanity. I play a recovering drug addict at a point in his life where it’ s really hard to remain strong and not go back to using. So it’ s a challenge on its own to have to play that duality, someone who wants to be strong but isn’ t.’
PASSION AND DRIVE What Slavko, and the film, also brilliantly portray is the passion and drive that music and creativity can inspire in someone in the shadow of trauma. Vlad lives out his dreams of playing music from his homeland with his friends, pushing them to take bigger financial and personal risks to achieve it. Music brought and bound the friends together, tumbling through gigs and parties and fall-outs and reunions.
One of Thea’ s key collaborators was composer and musical director Hugo Brijs, who brought the sound of Fuzia to life. The soundtrack is inspired by original Fuzia songs and some of us from the original band worked on the soundtrack and as musical consultants.
RISK OF RELAPSE As in real life, the film music also created situations where risk of relapse was present – working in a night-time economy and a culture infused with alcohol and drugs. Many musicians come into recovery unsure if they can, or even want to, carry on playing music.
It’ s in this context that we created Bristol Recovery Orchestra in 2019, as part of BDP Creative Communities. Creative Communities began in 2014, in the group work team where Vlad, Misko and Duncan spent many an afternoon jamming with clients in post-group sessions. While Rising Voices Choir is our longest standing group, and the only one Vlad was witness to, it’ s the orchestra that particularly resonates with Surviving Earth. Although we’ re partnered with Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, we’ re an orchestra in the loosest sense of the word. We welcome musicians of any background and instrument, and the only criteria is to play your instrument well enough to be able to follow a structure – and to have lived experience.
There are many reasons it exists, and people get many different things from it – confidence, fun, recovery support, new skills, and performance opportunities. Added to this, it’ s a space where people can experience the healing power of music away from the triggering settings where it’ s often created and performed. Some of our members have come into music after becoming drug free, while others are seeking a space where they can come back to their instruments and perform in a structured and drug-free environment.
SHARED EXPERIENCE Alex, a musician with years of gigging experience, says that‘ for someone like me with a lived experience of drug abuse, mental illness and trauma, working with an orchestra whose members share similar lived experiences gives us a great camaraderie in our process of growth and understanding of music and recovery.’
For others, it’ s a new experience that gently nudges people out of their comfort zone to create an incredible shared experience – something that’ s also passed onto our audiences.
Surviving Earth is well worth an hour and a half of your time – go see it, support independent film, and help shine a light on the complexities that lie behind every drugrelated death. And when we get together on stage later on in the year to celebrate 40 years of BDP, we’ ll also play music that reflects those who aren’ t with us any more – but whose creativity lives on through us.
Sophie Wilsdon is creative communities team leader at BDP
Surviving Earth is released in UK cinemas on 24 April @ survivingearthfilm @ bdpcreativecommunities @ bristoldrugsproject @ metisfilmsuk
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