Shot in the Dark

Power Trip subject Piers Lewis (l), who works for an energy provider, tries to placate enraged Tbilisi residents in the Republic of Georgia.

Filmmaker Paul Devlin (SlamNation, 1998) dubs his most recent film, Power Trip (2003), a "dramatic real-life thriller about corruption, assassination, and street-rioting over electricity in the former Soviet Union." Yes, you read that correctly – electricity. And that was Devlin's first reaction, too, when a former college chum working for an American power company in the former Soviet Republic of Georgia told him to get over there and make a movie about his company's outrageous travails trying to get the denizens of the Georgian capital, Tbilisi, to pay their electric bills. Seems that in a country where the average monthly salary was between $15 and $45, people were having trouble dancing to monthly electricity bills of $25. Essentially, they weren't buying this capitalist concept of paying for electricity: Power was something you got for free, pre-Perestroika, gratis the government; or, rolling with the political and economic upheavals post-independence, you simply helped yourself with a roll of cable and a pair of wire-cutters and tapped into a streetlight, a tram line, the metro. Either way, no money changed hands. Or at least that's the way it was until American-style capitalism came knocking.

Obviously, one of the most tangible experiences of how truly "over" communism was in this troubled but beautiful country situated in the Caucasus Mountains, near Turkey and Chechnya, was the arrival of AES Corp., the largest owner of power in the world, a multinational U.S. company with an unusually decentralized management style and the laudable mission of bringing competition to the power sector in remote parts of the world. AES had just purchased the recently privatized electricity distribution company Telasi, and it was Devlin's friend Piers Lewis' job, as project manager of AES-Telasi, to train the formerly communist populace that in this new world customers pay for their electricity. At the time, up to 40% of consumers illegally bypassed their electricity meters by rigging their wiring. As you can see, Lewis had his work cut out for him.

At first, Devlin explains, despite his friend's entreaties and the fact that he knew the long-haired, hip, and quirky Brit would make a terrific film narrator, he was skeptical that the story could be told cinematically; trying to portray the transition from collapsed communism to capitalism seemed too monumental a story with too many complicated abstractions to convey in a movie. "But then Piers explained that the reason for his shoulder-length hair was that he refused to cut it until the electricity bill collection rate increased from 10 percent to 50 percent," Devlin explains, "and I realized that Piers' daily visual reminder to his Georgian co-workers could provide a dramatic structure for the movie – whether or not Piers cut his hair would represent the progress of Georgian electricity reform."

And, in truth, Devlin's camera captured drama aplenty in footage of Georgians reading by candlelight, sitting expectantly in front of darkened TV screens in darkened living rooms waiting for the power to switch on, walking on preternaturally darkened city streets. Desktops of idle, unusable technology; moldy, dripping insides of fridges, full of warm, spoiled food; a bloody, electrocuted corpse in the street, the victim of a failed generator hijacking. As a journalist sums up: "Electricity is connected to hope, and, without it, people have lost their hope; it's oppressing."

Devlin arrived in Tbilisi in the spring of 2000 just as AES was laying out the offer it felt no reasonable Georgian could refuse (and one that would keep the shareholders back home happy, as well). The company would spend millions upgrading the power delivery system, install meters, and bill consumers for usage. No longer would it be necessary to risk electrocution to turn the lights on. Down came the makeshift wiring. Still, when the bills representing more than – or an unhealthy portion of – the average Georgian's monthly salaries started coming in, there was a hue and cry. And a refusal to pay. Instead, consumers, including the government, found ways to sabotage AES-Telasi's plan, circumvent their meters, and keep the electricity on. With the company losing $120,000 a day, Lewis had to get tough and start cutting off service for nonpayment (even for the airport, just as a plane was coming in). More public outcry, more widespread government corruption.

Devlin, who is also an award-winning network sports editor, made five trips to Tbilisi to shoot, staying three to four weeks each visit. Working by himself, he was able to shoot most of the film with his mini-DV camera, additional footage being shot by a local TV cameraman. The filmmaker's sports editing and shooting skills are certainly evident in Power Trip, which, combined with wonderful local music, makes for a stirring film about electric bills and their nonpayment. Of course, we also learn a whole lot about the colorful Republic of Georgia and its feisty inhabitants along the way.

"The biggest challenge was having faith that I wasn't completely wasting my time on an impossible topic that no one would be interested in. I knew that I had something worthwhile, spectacular even, but it was difficult to communicate that until the film was actually executed." – Paul Devlin

Austin Chronicle: What a hornets' nest you wandered into. What was the lesson there for you?

Paul Devlin: At first, I felt that trying to document the post-Soviet transition to capitalism would be too overwhelming a task. However, with some coaxing from Piers [who became the main subject in the film], I realized that by focusing on this one struggle for electricity in Tbilisi, I had a story that could also communicate some of the larger themes that have resulted from the historic transition from communism to capitalism. Power Trip illuminates, for example, how American optimism can sometimes be profoundly naive, because a system that works at home will not necessarily work in a foreign culture without first laying a groundwork of education and rule of law. The film also demonstrates the deep disappointment that independence has been to many post-Soviet states, to the point that some are even nostalgic for Soviet domination. And then there's the gradual understanding that electricity is like air to modern civilization – civilization dies without it, and when a society doesn't have it, it will do anything it can to get it.

AC: What was your biggest challenge in making this film?

PD: The biggest challenge was having faith that I wasn't completely wasting my time on an impossible topic that no one would be interested in. So, here I am, flying halfway around the world, spending all my time and money on a documentary about ... electricity? Where was that again, Tbilisi? My friends and associates were very polite, but I know they felt a bit sorry for me that I had so much committed to such an unlikely venture. I knew that I had something worthwhile, spectacular even, but it was difficult to communicate that until the film was actually executed, and hard to maintain faith in the face of all the politeness.

AC: Has the situation calmed down at all since the film was made?

PD: The Rose Revolution ousted President Shevardnadze and brought in President Saakashvili. Many high officials were thrown in prison, including the energy minister who appears in Power Trip. There is much more optimism in Georgia now that they have this new dynamic leader. After AES left, the electricity system was bought by the Russians. At first, they seemed to invest a lot, and it looked as if there would be some progress, but lately I have heard that many of the same problems persist in Georgia, and electricity supply is still very problematic.

AC: What's been the reaction to the film?

PD: The reactions have been overwhelmingly positive. I knew I had achieved my goal when we got notices like "Real Life Thriller" and "Dark Comedy" – the utterly unlikely topic had become exciting! Sometimes, we received vehement negative reactions, and these people seemed to be expecting a different film – most likely one that vilified AES rather than trying to find balance. For example, at IDFA, a major documentary film festival in Amsterdam, we were in a special section of American films commenting on America, most critically. After our film was over, a severely disappointed Dutch woman got up and went on a rant about how I was working for the CIA and was paid by AES to produce propaganda and that I should be ashamed of myself for taking away electricity from all those poor Georgians. She was venomous, and the moderator had to ask her to stop. That definitely produced some lively discussion, though, and made the festival newsletter.

Power Trip screens as part of the Texas Documentary Tour on Wednesday, Nov. 9, 7pm, at the Alamo Drafthouse Downtown. Paul Devlin will participate in a Q&A after the screening. Tickets ($4 for Austin Film Society members and students, and $6 for nonmembers) are available through the Austin Film Society (www.austinfilm.org) or at the venue one hour prior to screening.