If you live in Western Canada, Atlantic Canada or any rural area in between, just the mention of Brocket 99 will likely arouse feelings of outrage or embarrassed amusement. For folks in Southern Ontario, Quebec or Vancouver, Brocket 99 probably won't ring any bells.
But according to a young Vancouver filmmaker, no matter where you are in Canada, you need to know about Brocket 99 -- a controversial parody of a radio show made 20 years ago in southern Alberta that dredged up every negative stereotype about aboriginal people and went on to grab ears around the world.
Nilesh Patel is putting the finishing touches on a documentary about the cult-like status the tape has achieved and Canadians' reactions to it.
The producer/director has held previews of Brocket 99 -- Rockin' the Country in Vancouver, but tomorrow he is set to bring his film to Calgary, hoping to answer some questions that have remained with him since first hearing the tape 15 years ago.
"Why is there a receptive audience? Why does somebody who grew up in southern Alberta and somebody in Saint John find the same jokes about aboriginals funny?" Patel says.
"How does it travel so far across Canada and a lot of the United States and now Europe without being sold, marketed or distributed? It's something to reflect upon as Canadians," he adds.
Patel, 29, was a high-school student in Prince George, B.C., in 1990 when he first heard Brocket 99. He remembers a group of friends piling into a car, jamming a bootlegged cassette into the tape player and listening to a litany of jokes about natives being drunk, lazy and stupid on the 88-minute recording.
"It made me laugh," recalls Patel, himself the son of immigrants from India who knows what it's like to be part of a minority group. "It's offensive. You don't forget something that's really that offensive."
The premise: A fictitious native radio program based in Brocket, a real-life Indian reserve about two hours south of Calgary, hosted by a character dubbed Ernie Scar.
The tape was actually recorded by a group of white guys with radio backgrounds in Lethbridge, Alta., in 1986.
But on the tape, Scar, complete with a native-sounding accent, tries to entice the handful of hard-working natives into becoming drunkards and bums -- just like everybody else. There's also a substance-abuse hotline that tells callers where to buy drugs and alcohol. Another segment suggests that the best way to deal with drunk, troublemaking natives is to load them into a car and drop them off outside of town. (This suggestion came four years before the freezing death outside Saskatoon of aboriginal teenager Neil Stonechild, who was in police custody when last seen alive.) Non-natives, often referred to as "whitey," aren't spared from ridicule either.
A few years ago, Patel stumbled across a downloadable version of Brocket 99 on the Internet while browsing for comedy recordings. He thought about how much time had passed, yet this recording was still making the rounds. He started asking people if they'd heard of the recording. He found that anybody who had any relationship with first nations -- mostly by geography -- had listened to it or at least heard of it. But those with no contact with aboriginal people just shook their heads. (I spent most of my life in urban centres around Ontario and didn't hear about the tape until I moved to Calgary, where it was one of the first things that came up in conversation.)
Patel had the spark for his next project. Shooting digital and 16 mm, he and three others set out last summer to tour Western Canada aiming to explore the relationship between aboriginal and other ethnic groups in Canada.
While wearing a "Brocket 99" T-shirt around country fairs and city streets, Patel found that people from all backgrounds and ages would approach him to express their thoughts about the tape.
Funny. Racist. Hateful.
He found aboriginal people both in Brocket and elsewhere mostly shrugged it off.
"For them, it's just a 90-minute compilation of all the jokes and racism they've heard throughout their lives. So was it a big deal to them? Not really. What bothers them right now is the website," Patel says.
There were a couple of fan sites. One is Canadian; it was recently shut down, but the founder appears, and not flatteringly, in the film. Another is based in the United States and lauds the creators of the tape for "bringing this piece of genius into our lives."
Those responsible for the tape wouldn't appear in the film. However, Patel says, the man considered the driving force behind it insists the tape is a radio parody and is misinterpreted as racist.
So far, Patel is getting a cold reception by broadcasters who either don't see the appeal of the film or view it as inflammatory. But he is moving forward with re-editing, raising funds and trying to find a distributor.
"I felt it needed to be made," Patel says, "At some point you become a proud Canadian and you look at Canada a little closer."
Brocket 99 -- Rockin' the Country screens tomorrow, 6 to 9 p.m., at the Uptown Theatre, 612 8th Ave. S.W., in Calgary.