Exclusive Interview: Pop Culturalist Chats with Florian’s Knights’ Panayioti Yannitsos and Rod MacDonald

Director Panayioti Yannitsos and retired Vancouver Battalion Chief Rod MacDonald sat down with us to chat about their gripping documentary Florian’s Knights. The powerful film follows firefighters in both the US and Canada who turn to wind therapy as a coping mechanism to deal with the crippling effects of PTSD.

PC: Pan, tell us about Florian’s Knights and what audiences can expect.
Pan: Florian’s Knights is about a group of firefighters who form a motorcycle club as a coping strategy for the post-traumatic stress they incur from their jobs as firefighters. Riding bikes is a stress reliever for them. We came across this club in Vancouver. They opened a chapter in New York City with the New York fire department. We follow their journey as they grow the club and become spokespeople for mental health.

The film is a bigger conversation about what firefighters see on a daily basis and what they do to cope with the things they have seen while helping the public.

PC: Rod, throughout the film we see the stigma surrounding mental health and the fire department. Can you share a bit of your own journey? Why was it important for you to be a part of this film?
Rod: It wasn’t crystal clear at the beginning. As the project grew, we became more aware of where the documentary was headed and that elevated its importance in my head as to what this was about and how it might benefit so many people. It became a documentary of love. We were quite excited about it and hopeful about it, and that’s why we’re here today.

PC: Pan, trust is such a huge component of documentary filmmaking. How were you able to build that with everyone that’s featured in the film, and get them to open up about these sensitive topics?
Pan: The important thing was that we really believed in the healing part of the narrative. The more guys I spoke to and the more research I did, the more I found that the concept of wind therapy while on a motorcycle was something we really believed in. We recognized it to be a valid trend within the first responder community, and then we built a relationship with the firefighters over that shared belief that wind therapy is real and that a motorcycle can be a coping strategy for PTSD.

There was kind of an understanding between us that if we were going to talk about the healing we would also have to talk about the trauma. We wanted to address it through a positive lens, but we had to show why we were on the bikes in the first place.

When our firefighters understood that, we were able to cross that bridge and do something I think people in media haven’t been able to do within the fire department—because for a long time there was a moratorium on portraying mental health matters within the fire department to the public. Within the fire halls, guys were doing their own thing—talking about it, sitting at the kitchen table, all of that. But in terms of opening that up to the public, what we’ve done in this movie is new ground. We had to first come in on the back of a bike, but here we are.

PC: Why do you think it’s taken so long to see this depicted?
Rod: A large element of that had to do with the inner sanctum of the firehouse. We tend to keep things hidden when it comes to our personal lives and what we face during work. The public couldn’t possibly know about these issues. It was kept down. It was an unwritten, unspoken code in a sense. We don’t talk about that stuff to the public. We work it out in the firehouse.

As it turns out, our recipe for healing wasn’t working. A lot of it unfortunately revolved around substance abuse and that sort of medicine. This movie shows how a group of men who didn’t really realize how it was working came to discover that their motorcycles were their medicine. Pan really brought that out in this documentary.

I didn’t know where he was headed when we were doing the scenes. It was all unscripted. There were no words. I wondered, “Where is he going with this?” But then I saw the finished project. I was like, “This guy is a genius.” He brought it together and it’s brilliant.

PC: Rod, finding your community is a common theme throughout the film. What role has community played in helping you come to terms with your own mental health?
Rod: Before I was a member of the Florian Knights, I was in dire straits. My family was at a loss as to what to do. Nothing was working. I had thoughts of suicide. It was getting nasty.

I, by chance, happened to meet these guys at a bike show that I’d ridden to. They invited me to the club and I became a member. After that, I spent so much of my time with that community. It turned me around. The day when it all broke down was a very serious day for me. I had to hang on again to things that hadn’t worked in the past. It was tough to deal with.

PC: I’m glad you found that community. Pan, this has been a three-year journey for you. What’s one thing that you know now that you wish you knew when you started? What’s the biggest lesson that you’ve learned working on this project that you’ll take to future projects?
Pan: That’s a good question. Sometimes the not knowing helps you in the process when you’re dealing with such a serious subject matter. Sometimes your own naive behavior saves your tail. One thing that we learned was to never underestimate how intense the ride alongs with the department could be and how sporadic and unpredictable those environments can be when you’re in a life-saving situation.

We did a lot of learning on the go. I sometimes think about how we had a horseshoe with us because there were so many moments where if one other thing would have happened my crew could have been in danger. We got out of it fine, but I probably would have done more safety training to prepare ourselves.

But in retrospect, the not-knowing allowed us to trust our instincts and adapt. It was a double-edged sword. But in terms of the next film, I’ll prepare my crew for more sporadic and unforgiving environments because that’s the nature of documentary cinema. You’re at the mercy of the normal cadences in life, and there’s only so much you can prepare.

Rod: I can say that given the subject matter, to this day, I remain incredulous at how Pan and his crew were given the access they were.

PC: What do you hope audiences take away after they see the film?
Pan: I really want audiences to understand that the job of a firefighter is extremely diverse. It’s not just the odd structure fire. It’s medical calls. It’s infants. It’s suicides. It’s drug overdoses. That’s the one thing I really hope people take away.

We’re talking about mental health, the fire department, and these guys who ride motorcycles. The next time you see a bunch of guys in vests riding through your neighborhood, you might have an instinct to be like, “Why are these guys in my neighborhood?” But for the most part, these guys are riding for their own mental health or to raise money for charitable causes. The motorcycle community is a really impactful, beneficial community. They raise a ton of money. All of the guys who ride are doing it for the right reason. Not everything you see is Sons of Anarchy.

Rod: First and foremost, I hope audiences take away the message about mental health in first responders. Second, that we’re under a great deal of stress, day in and day out. If we don’t have the appropriate number of personnel arriving, the stressors are multiplied exponentially.

We need to have the men and women onsite to address the emergency issues. If you’re facing cutbacks and they’re talking about taking firefighters away, rethink that. It’s difficult enough, and asking to do more with less is a recipe for bad things to happen.

Make sure to follow Pan (Twitter/Instagram). Watch Florian’s Knights in select theaters now.