Interview with the team behind "Quwa": short film screening at SBIFF

QUWA screening at Santa Barbara Film Festival 2025, a film by Jade Ipina (co-producer), Jonathan Coronado (sound designer), Ryan C.Grant (director of photography and co-editor)  and Catherine Scanlon (co-producer and assistant camera/editor).

Interview by Emmanuel Itier

I was truly taken by surprise by ‘Quwa’, a short film, exploring the history of the Goleta Slough and the historical Chumash island Quwa who was once there. I leave nearby and I drive by the area near the airport which was one sacred Chumash land. I feel now so much sadness and anger when knowing the horrific truth about the Native American genocide. This film assembles beautiful shots captured by a team of very talented filmmaker with a bright future. This was for them a school project at UCSB, and their accomplishment must be saluted as they had little time and resources to bring it to the screen and display it, proudly, to the Santa Barbara film festival audience. Let’s also honor two amazing Chumash elders who are the voices of their tribe in this film: Ernestine Ygnacio-De Soto and Marianne Parra. Two magnificent strong women who carry on the legacy of the Chumash people.

I was lucky to get together with the four filmmakers before the festival. Even so I have directed 10 feature documentaries for the last 20 years, shot around the World, I was moved by their passion and their creativity. I saw in their soul the justice flame to tell the truth about this dramatic page of our local history. Bravo!

Q: Who directed the movie?

Together: We all are! This is a true collaboration between us, and we felt we jointly directed this movie.

Q: It’s funny because Jean-Luc Godard used to do this in his film. In the end credits he would put “Directed by” and list everyone who worked on the film.

Jade: Everybody was able to do a little bit of everything. Everyone did a little bit of camera and editing. We all had a say when we edited. This was a project where we needed to pick up the most important pieces of information. It was important to be there as a group to make the right decisions.

Q: What inspired you to talk about this subject and tell this story?

Jade: It all came together because of a class assignment we had.  We had the chance to check online and find a subject of interest. Catherine is the one who had found the story of the island on her own. This clearly caught my attention when it was mentioned in class by our professor. I went myself online to do some more research. This is how we got our first interview with Tom Modugno who has the website www.GoletaHistory.com  . This is where I was able to read more about the island. I couldn’t believe what I was discovering. How can there have been an island when now there is an airport and UCSB?! I didn’t know also about the Goleta Slough; I thought it was just a swamp. Tom’s website opened my eyes about the Chumash and their island. It really was a political and cultural center for them. And then I found out about the horror the Chumash went through by being colonized. They were killed or had to leave or be brought to the Santa Barbara mission. And then the island was destroyed, and the land was used to build an airport during World War II. Today there is just a little part of the island still standing and we drive by without noticing; it’s owned by the Goleta sanitary district, and it’s abandoned. It’s sad to see that there is still a little bit of land and that it could be returned to the Chumash.

Catherine: I must give credit to Jade because I couldn’t visually figure out how we could make a film from that story I found about the island. Because the island is gone, I didn’t believe we could pull it. But Jade has that vision about how to make it and I’m glad she got me involved into making this short.

Ryan: I came on board later than the rest of them. I was supposed to collaborate with another group of filmmakers, but their idea never really came through. But when Jade talked about this project, it really got my interest. I grew up in very safe areas and so I’m curious about stories of atrocities like this one. I’m interested with our past and how it haunts us, sometimes, about what we have done to get the land we stand on and where we build our properties on. Hearing about that story about the most populated Chumash area with that island and how now it’s a pile of dirt, I was shocked by that fact. And therefore, I wanted to explore how this happened and what could be done to make amend in some way or, at least, recognized it happened. It was tough as the main camera person to present an island that doesn’t exist anymore, what do you film about it? It was challenge but this is what drew me to this project overall. 

Jonathan: Hearing Jade talk about it made me curious to see how it would turn out. This is the only idea presented to me that got my enthusiasm to be part of it.  

Catherine: I had a connection with the Goleta slough because I bike ride and I can hear the frogs in the evening. Santa Barbara airport is my favorite airport because it’s so cut and so convenient. So, for me to learn all about the history behind the airport was quite eye opening and so inspiring. 

Q: Tell me about your biggest challenges making this film and what did you learn making it?

Jade: For us, the biggest challenge was to get our indigenous voices.

Q: And I love Ernestine, so strong, my kind of woman!

Jade: Yes, and she is just like that, on and off camera. It was very important for us to get these voices to get their perspectives.  We were in the middle of making that film and we still didn’t have our indigenous voices. We even considered going into a different direction story wise, with a more ecological restauration focus.  But Catherine had a friend who is related to Ernestine, and we had a breakthrough, and we got her on board. It was really an honor to be in the presence of this woman. Also, in terms of editing it was hard to select the quotes that were going to   help us build the best movie possible, especially because we had so many good interviews with everyone. At one point we were laughing and said it could be a docu series because we had so many materials.  This was one of the toughest aspects to pick up the most impactful parts of the interview we made with everyone to build the best short as possible.

Ryan: Representing an island that is not there anymore was a big challenge. Having b-roll is a big challenge on top of getting your main interviewees. It was tough to illustrate what some of the speakers were talking about when you have no footage of anything to support that illustration. We found some artwork about the island, and we made sure to include it in our movie. You hear that the island had Oak trees on it, and it had active springs. So, we had to find location and use inserts to illustrate what the island had. What surprised me the most was the angle of reciprocity, what could be returned to this island. This land has been destroyed. Colonialism erased this history. I felt nothing could be done about this. And yet, when we heard Ernestine and Marianne speak about this, we really found out that there were tangible solutions to this. You could put an airport tax on the airport for taking this land from the Chumash. You could have ecological restauration and to restore plant that once thrived there. That was my concern also to try to have a more uplifting ending. We did implement a more organic hopeful conclusion to that narrative we put together.

Jonathan: I was not only the sound designer but also the sound recordist and I had never touched an equipment that records sound. I really had to take a deep dive into doing it. I had to figure out the whole process of recording sound. I really had to be careful the sound was properly recorded and not be on “mute”. How do we make something that doesn’t exist be heard and be seen. We did an exercise in Santa Cruz where we had to be blindfolded and walk in nature. I took inspiration from this exercise, and I focused on hearing the nature’ sounds. This was a challenge for the sound design.  And, for the foley. We did so much foley for this film. And of course, there was the Chumash music which was a challenge by itself. We had to record our interviewees who agreed to do the music in a studio. And I had never touched a microphone, so you can imagine how I felt in the studio trying to pass for a professional. Despite coming from zero I feel, watching the movie, that I have made it, and I have overcome all the challenges I faced during the making of it.

Catherine: I had never used a professional camera before. But I was lucky that Ryan had some experience. We all learned a lot making this film. We used mainly the camera Canon C300. It was all shot in 4K. But of course, at times, I went and filmed something and when I came back, we realized it was all out of focus. It was a learning process for sure. Also, I didn’t realize how much time it takes coordinating with so many people and through emails. I had to manage so many relationships. Finally, after we got some feedback from our professor, we were told we needed more diverse b-rolls. So, in full postproduction we had to go back and shoot more shots to make it work.

Q: What impact do you hope this film has? What type of conversations it triggers?

Jade: Look at current times and how we are continuously progressing, economic infrastructures. All the time we are always building new things. I think this film can really show people that we need to be looking back on the history of what you are building on. Especially when it was land owned by indigenous populations. It’s important to be aware of the history. This film can expend to other places because we are always building on top of new lands. And, again, it’s important to know what you are building on. Being more aware of the history of a place it gives you a better understanding of why we should be protecting land like the Goleta Slough. I want to also have people realize that land-back is not so far-fetched. For this film, land-back seemed out of reach and we were not sure what was the next step towards it. So, educating ourselves and listening to these indigenous voices made us realize that nothing is impossible. I think it’s the case with lots of issues today like women’s rights and racial injustice. And even so we think we can’t do anything about these issues there are things you can do about it. Especially about educating yourself about these topics.

Ryan: I hope this film provides a platform for the voices that are often under-represented. Especially for the Chumash in this case. Also, the Santa Barbara airport sucks and the noise pollution is bad because they fly over my apartment every day!

Catherine: We tried to film an interview near where you live, near the airport and UCSB and this was simply impossible, noise wise! It was for the interview with Marianne. We tried to film it on campus, and it was a nightmare because we had this one plane that kept circling above us every time she was speaking!

Jonathan: For me “representation” is the most important thing we can get from this documentary. I feel that like a Latino person there aren’t so many stories that show the culture and what was here before the colonialism. I usually feel disconnected with my own culture because I am an American. I could only imagine what Native Americans have been through even though there were Natives. I feel it's very important for people who watch it to get the notion of “representation”. II hope it opens the mind of people, especially in these times when it feels like we are going backwards. Instead of acceptance it looks like we are accepting division.

Catherine: What can I add to all these good points? I hope, in any case, this film will hope people have curiosity about where they live. Let’s hope people listen to the land where there live and they learn to reconnect to that history and that truth that is there, sometime buried by a wrong new narration. I hope this film encourage people to learn from what’s around them and especially from indigenous people like Ernestine and Marianne. They are advocates and they have so much more to say, if you want to listen to them…