My award-winning documentary Naneek
A few years back, I took a stab at knocking off a bucket list item. All it took was quitting a job with a huge salary and benefits and losing much of my savings. BUT, mission was accomplished. To give an introduction to how it all came to be, I’m going to lean on an interview with the talented David Klein of Lake Front Row. A master of words, and an interview that got to the root of why I took the leap of faith.
Like the film, the story behind Naneek is nothing short of extraordinary. Steeno, who for some time was broke and living out of his car, literally followed his dream to make it, galvanized by a lucid vision and sold on Keenan’s willingness to reconnect with his son. Naneek bears little sign of improvised planning, lost footage, or threadbare connections to a foreign population but make no mistake, those were all a part of the creative process. Ahead of Naneek playing this week at the Milwaukee Film Festival, I spoke with director Neal Steeno about how he managed to wind up in Southeast Asia in the first place.
How does one find themselves making a movie in Vietnam?
After I graduated from Michigan State, I worked for AmeriCorps in Eugene, Oregon doing trail work. I ended up leaving the service early to pursue an audition in Los Angeles and had to find my way back home, but you can’t get out of this city on your own and by leaving early I had no transportation. So, and this is a little weird, but I would go up to interesting-looking locals with gnarly looking beards and ask them why they grew their beards. Eventually, it would evolve into these half-hour, hour-long conversations with this men pouring out their hearts and their history.
Fast forward to 2011. After meeting all of those men, I had formed a pilot project in northern Michigan and called it “Weathered Beard”, where we would do live storytelling, like “The Moth.” We would feature five speakers once a month and pack in 200-300 people at a cool theater in Traverse City. You would describe why you grew out your beard and then tell a story that’s endearing, changing of life perspective, whatever.
I was also dating a girl at the time who was treating this guy Tim “Naneek” Keenan, and she was like “You’ve got to meet this cat.” So Tim and I met and eventually he tells this story [for “Weathered Beard”] about how much he hated this colonel, “the Griz,” that was calling the shots above these hills in Vietnam. Tim met the colonel decades later after a phone call from a friend of a friend. The man said he knew a Vietnam war colonel who lived on an island down South in Florida, I believe. Tim blew it off thinking there’s no way it could ever be the “Griz.” Sure enough, another phone call later, it was him. Over a period of time, they eventually met. He embraced Tim and, I kid you not, they became close thereafter until his passing. The story went full circle where Tim realized he never understood what the colonel was going through. Tim came away from the war hating this man until, at the end of this man’s life, Tim ended up speaking at his eulogy. Tim was asked by the “Griz” himself to speak at his eulogy. It was this beautiful story. Everyone was captivated. He went on for 45 minutes, but nobody cared about the time. It was incredible, and I remember thinking ‘This can’t be it. This guy needs to be heard.’
When did you seriously start talking to Tim about going back?
Tim would gradually open up to me more over the years but he would always say he never wanted to go back, so the idea never crossed our mind. The real reason Naneek came to life was this, and I don’t know if this is like a weird Godsend thing, but I had a dream that I was filming Tim in Vietnam, and I never remember my dreams. It freaked me out. I woke up in sweats feeling as though I had just been there with Tim. The following morning I knew I had to give him a call and talk to him about it, and when he picked up, before I said anything, he said “I’m ready to go back.”
What about this dream prompted you to reach out to Tim, though? Especially for someone who doesn’t remember his dreams?
I felt pulled to do something. Something compelled me that morning. I will say this, though. That same day, I went to a coffee shop and Mark Borchardt from American Movie was sitting next to me in downtown Milwaukee. Right before I left, I went up and asked if he had a mantra he lived by and if he could write it in this book I was reading, What Should I Do With My Life. He wrote “Neal, Please please don’t waste time and be true to yourself.” And I thought, ‘Bingo. That’s it.’
Was bringing Jake with your idea? Or Tim’s?
That was Tim’s. Tim said that the only way he would ever go back is if Jake got his passport, too. He thought at the time, and maintains to this day, that Jake would never get his passport.
How long were you actually in Vietnam for? Naneek suggests that you’re jumping around a lot, in addition to covering so much emotional ground.
We were gone for 10 days and we were not traveling for seven of them. If you were to look at this from the perspective of a producer, how do you get in contact with North Vietnamese soldiers who fought in 1968, fought against Tim? I was researching it and thinking there’s just no way. There’s an author out of Traverse City named Doug Stanton, author of Horse Soldiers, who suggested we go with an old veteran who was married to a Vietnamese woman, Nguyen Anh, and that’s the woman you see in the film. We contacted her and without our knowledge, she ended up coordinating the entire meeting with the five People’s Army soldiers and then proceeded to research how the hell we would even get to Hill 1338, because they really don’t have precise maps like we do here in the states.
You make it sound like it wasn’t planned that Tim would have this reckoning with his past.
It wasn’t. We knew we wanted to get to the hill. That was our biggest goal. Anh said she had a big day planned on Tues and that a few men would like to meet Tim. So Mr. Thuat, who you also see in the film, corralled all these guys and when they showed up, man, you don’t realize how much respect you have for these men until you’re there in person. All these short guys come in with the look and demeanor of ‘What the f are you doing here?’ but they showed up. Tim was scared straight the night before, as anyone would be, meeting people who wanted him dead.
Much more was discussed, but to those interested, here is the film I poured my heart into. I’m forever grateful and still thankful to have one of my dearest friends Tim allow me this honor.