(re-printed from the NYC Movie Guru)
NYC MOVIE GURU: What kind of experience do you have in health activism?
SK: I’ve never been an activist in the health field, although I've always been steadfast about supporting any environmental cause that makes this world a better, healthier place. Since I was a small child, I did appearances with wild animals, even in New York on The Today Show and on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. As I got older, I started to make the connection between human health and the environment. That, I thought, would be a huge thread that could tie in a wide audience. That’s where Dr. Max Gerson came into play.
NYC MOVIE GURU: Which distributors did you approach before The Beautiful Truth ended up at Cinema Libre Studio? How did they respond to you?
SK: Paramount Vantage, Fox and Sony saw it and said that this was such a liability [to them] that they don’t even want to consider it. They didn’t quite know where to put the film because it was just in a class of its own. Then you’ve got this brave, dynamic little distributor, Cinema Libre, and they just loved it. We had an instantly positive relationship once they saw the film.
NYC MOVIE GURU: How did you manage to find the right balance between entertaining the audience and provoking them intellectually?
SK: I’ve been a filmmaker for 20 years, mainly for the BBC and National Geographic, and that’s like preaching to the choir. That’s a limited audience. I have been involved with several major studios in films that went wide, but they weren’t about health. I did learn over time that a film about cancer and chronic disease could be very dry and unsatisfying to an audience unless you had a good story. That’s why I would try that angle, especially since my 15-year-old son was so doubtful about this message being truly real.
NYC MOVIE GURU: Why do you think the majority of the American public has so much apathy toward their own health?
SK: Dr. Max Gerson said himself that, “Cancer is easy to cure. The problem is that it’s in people.” He also went on to say that, unless the surgeon’s knife is at their throat, they will not follow his message. It’s just something innate in us, I think, that we want to self-destruct. I think people are their own worst enemies. You can take someone to court if they spit on your shoe, but [yet], if we eat the wrong [food] every day, it’s like we’re stabbing ourselves with our spoons and forks and knives that we have at the kitchen table. It’s still a bit mystifying to me why people remained unconcerned. Also, so many in the past “claimed” that they have a cure and can defeat cancer and chronic disease because, after all, some of those that have tried it in the past, were just a big joke and were called quacks. Then you have the trillion-dollar pharmaceutical industry that is always updating their progress in curing diseases. There’s an incredulous nature in us, too, and that just drives me more to make this film attractive to everybody.
NYC MOVIE GURU: How do you respond to the common public response that “everything should be in moderation”?
SK: The way our bodies are designed are for us to eat in a certain way. We have violated that time and time again. What is so extreme about eating a baked potato and drinking a glass of vegetable juice when you compare it to the orthodox, conventional treatment of breast cancer by cutting a woman’s breast off the save her from cancer? Which one is extreme? Dr. Max Gerson was all about the baked potato and the vegetable juice; conventional medicine and Big Pharma are about drugs that are completely unnatural [and] as we’ve discovered, i.e. Vioxx it sometimes kills 50,000 people, or about taking out people’s organs while still not curing their disease.
NYC MOVIE GURU: Why don’t mainstream media help to expose such important cover-ups?
SK: Look at the nightly news, for example. It’s supported by corporations that are promoting drugs. I don’t have a television up here in my Alaskan cabin, but the last time I looked at a TV at an airport in Juneau, the advertisements were all about drugs. Most of the drugs advertised in these commercials are promoting an answer for something, whether it be a headache or insomnia, with a drug. Dr. Max Gerson’s therapy alone would cure that and you wouldn’t have to buy anything. The only way that the mainstream media will be finding something like this attractive is if the people vote. [Democracy] would be [occurring] by going to see this film and examining it for yourself. You just have to dig under all the crud of everyday media and find the real truth, the beautiful truth. The science is there. The facts are there. It’s undeniable and can be scrutinized right down to the letter. It is a real thing that’s never really been picked up.
NYC MOVIE GURU: Are food, beverage, hygiene and drug corporations as well as the FDA and other agencies, such as the American Dietetic Association, part of a cover-up of crucial information that’s relevant to consumer health?
SK: There’s absolutely a cover-up. They don’t want to talk. We contacted Monsanto, ConAgra and a number of food companies. Most of them wouldn’t even return our calls and when we repeatedly went after ConAgra and Monsanto, they just bullied us. It was nothing that I had expected otherwise, but I lived it out. We went to the ConAgra facility as a last effort, but we were pushed away right at the gate. If they do talk, they have prepared statements. It’s nothing off-the-cuff. They won’t tell you the truth, but I wanted them to. I wanted them to speak. I tried to make it a balanced film. What you see in this documentary is the truth. It’s Garrett’s journey. Garrett still today can’t believe what he saw with his own eyes.
NYC MOVIE GURU: How did the FDA respond to you?
SK: They didn’t give us any response. We had to go with the printed word that was available in libraries and various other sources. We did include, at one point, a comparison between Monsanto’s explanation of genetically modified food and their position on it that the FDA is supposed to determine what’s healthy and safe to eat. Garrett showed that statement from the head of Monsanto and then we also had a statement directly from the FDA which stated that ultimately it is the food producer who is responsible for the safety of food. Those two statements side-to-side should pretty much erase the confidence of the general public that the FDA is looking out for their health.
NYC MOVIE GURU: Who should ultimately be held accountable? The cheaters or the administration(s) that allow them to cheat?
SK: They all have to be held accountable, but maybe that’s hoping for a perfect world. In reality, we have to hold up the hope that the public can put enough pressure on government agencies to reexamine their policies and to take a different path. Ten years ago, this might not have been so urgent, but at this stage of history, with the degradation of the environment, we have to move fast now because we have reached a milestone in human history. If we do not pay attention to these “tiny” details of what we eat everyday, we are not going to leave a healthy legacy for our children. What kind of a future do we have for them? I have a very difficult time keeping a positive message for young people. When I presentations about the natural world at schools, it’s becoming increasingly harder to convince young people that they have a future. Many think that there’s not going to be any clean air to breathe or clean water to drink and they’re 25-years-old. It goes on and on. You can see clearly in the last ten years, that what we have taken for granted in the food we eat and the water we drink, that so much has changed. There are so many toxins everywhere now that we have to make a change whether we like it or not.
NYC MOVIE GURU: How do you expect the public to react to the exposures of all these health cover-ups?
SK: Enraged to the point of action and not just talking about it. Write letters to congress, vote in the right way and get educated and learn about these things. With the advent of the internet now, there’s so much information and disinformation out there. You’ve got to do the homework. Your health and life depends on it. We have no time to waste. Things have reached a crescendo. That’s why I made this film, virtually, singlehandedly because I want to get the public aware of what’s going on. Dr. Max Gerson warned about this 80 years ago. He said that the soil is our external metabolism. What’s happening to our soil and our farmlands? There’s nothing left in the soil that grows our food. When you add all the chemicals and everything else to it, no wonder everybody’s sick. No wonder that every one out of two people get cancer.
NYC MOVIE GURU: Do you think that history is repeating itself like what happened during the cigarette and tobacco industry cover-up?
SK: History is repeating itself because we are just too complacent to a fault.
NYC MOVIE GURU: What agencies can the public truly rely on to protect their health?
SK: One of the best ones is The Natural Resource and Defense Council which has attorneys that leverage our basic rights to put pressure on these companies, including Monsanto. Then, you can go to the Sierra Club, The World Wildlife Foundation, The National Health Federation and National Health Freedom. If you go onto any of those links, then you can start to network, learn the truth and get yourself educated.
NYC MOVIE GURU: What does the word “Natural” mean when stated on a product?
SK: Natural doesn’t mean anything anymore. It has to be organic. Natural popcorn can have arsenic dust on it, but it’s still natural [based on the FDA’s definition of natural]. Organic popcorn is free of chemical sprays and poisons. Natural, conventionally grown vegetables would not be that way. Organic crops have all of the nutritional minerals thought our body needs. Also, [the term] “natural” could include genetically modified foods, which are far from natural, but they still fall under the [FDA’s definition] of being natural. It’s a very misleading term and it has worn out its welcome. No one is really following it. Virtually all food manufacturers know better, but they still print out their promotional ads with a straight face and that’s very, very sad. There’s a few [manufacturers] that try [to be honest], but, [again], “natural” is a very misleading term.
NYC MOVIE GURU: What’s stopping the FDA from directly answering questions about such important health matters?
SK: The FDA is owned by food and pharmaceutical companies. As a matter of fact, in the The Beautiful Truth, we show you names of people who have worked on both sides. Some who have worked for the FDA also have worked for Monsanto. It goes back and forth, so you have what’s called a “revolving door”. Garrett just touched on it in his homework lesson, [but] it’s so pathetic and shocking that people won’t be able to believe it [even though] it is the truth. Do the research that Garrett did. He’s 15-years-old. If he could do it, then most of us could do it.
NYC MOVIE GURU: Should the American public trust the FDA?
SK: No. There’s this inside pressure from the corporate giants who control and the FDA is merely a puppet. Herbert Lay, the former Commissioner of the FDA, himself said, “The thing that bugs me is that people think the FDA is protecting them. It isn’t. What the FDA is doing and what the public thinks it’s doing are as different as night and day.”
NYC MOVIE GURU: What will it take for the FDA to finally face the music about all the health cover-ups?
SK: The only thing is going to make a difference is public pressure, to stop buying those kinds of products, and to refuse to accept drugs as a treatment for our chronic diseases. [We should] refuse the various kinds of foods that are truly poisoning us and [should] buy whole foods that are organic and healthy. We should look seriously at alternative forms of treatment for cancer and chronic disease. There are a number of them and they have been ignored. The Gerson Therapy is one of the main ones, it has been tried and proved for eight decades.
NYC MOVIE GURU: What will it take for corporations to truly listen to the public?
SK: If money is the bottom line, then money is what speaks, apparently. When they start to lose it and people start to get educated about it and demand a change, then it can happen. We’re at a very great turning point where we have the internet and we’re able to communicate very rapidly. It worked so fantastically in our latest elections, for example.
NYC MOVIE GURU: How could doctors, employees of corporations and of government agencies live with themselves and behave in such an amoral way yet still have a conscience? Don’t they care about their family and friends?
SK: Some of them do [have a conscience]. Doctors and their families, [though], [rarely serve as] participants in using chemotherapy to treat [their own] cancer. They know better than that. There’s an example of the industry saying one thing, but doing another. Many of those who work for Monsanto don’t have that information. If they do, then they’re blind and can’t believe it themselves. Money speaks, so they’re willing to work there. It’s their living and that’s that. Do any of us really know how the executives of these companies truly live? Adolf Hitler, for example, kidnapped Dr. Max Gerson and followed The Gerson Therapy himself. He did not want the rest of the people to eat that way because they couldn’t control them. These are historical facts. What the general public does is different from the way that the heads and families of these corporations do themselves. There has been a great deal of inquiry and investigation into that and we’re learning things about. Coca-Cola and some of these soft drinks, for example, are not really part of the lunch period for some of the employees at various soft drink factories. They know that it’s not good for you.
NYC MOVIE GURU: In her response to inquiries about what she products she asked from the Republican National Committee, Alaskan Governor Sarah Palin replied that, “I only asked for a Diet Dr. Pepper once in a while.” Does her consumption of that diet pop soda have any harmful effects on her health?
SK: Yes, it does because drinking those kinds of fluids clouds our minds, so we can’t respond right, because they have excitotoxins that destroy our brain cells. A simple act of drinking a Diet Pepsi or Diet Coke or Diet Dr. Pepper, which is one of the worst, can actually make us dumber. We’re getting dumbed down by the food and beverages that we eat and drink. So, we’re turning into a bunch of sheep. Adolf Hitler tried to do that with fluoride. He tried to control and sterilize the public by putting fluoride in their water, and [a similar thing] is happening right now.
NYC MOVIE GURU: Dr. Robert Atkins once said that “There have been many cancer cures and all have been ruthlessly and systematically suppressed with a Gestapo-like thoroughness by the cancer establishment”. Do you think that government agencies along with food, beverage and drug corporations are truly Gestapo-like?
SK: It’s even a soft word for what it actually is. Look at what’s happening to our healthcare. People are being killed [by drugs and diseases] needlessly, and there’s the suppression of natural treatments and answers, like The Gerson Therapy, to cancer and chronic diseases. Charlotte Gerson lived through the Holocaust and Dr. Max Gerson’s siblings were all killed in the Holocaust while she fled Nazi persecution. According to her, what’s happening now is worse than the Holocaust. She compares the whole healthcare system. It’s such a big issue in our world as to who’s going to pay for the drugs and surgery, but, basically, if you eat right, that is your healthcare. Doing something as simple and innocent as that can be your healthcare, so that, biologically, you cannot get cancer. Let’s say you were in fallout from a nuclear explosion, you will not be able to get cancer. Charlotte Gerson does not even have health insurance because she’s afraid that if she goes to a hospital, they’ll kill her. The errors that have been done by physicians every day in America alone is equivalent to three jumbo jets full of people crashing every day. Consumer health advocate and author Kevin Trudeau has done a lot of good to expose that. He’s exploiting all of that for great advantage.
NYC MOVIE GURU: How would you reform the FDA if you were its Commissioner?
SK: They shouldn’t be allowed to work for the corporations that they’re supposed to regulate at one time or another, for starters. They should be just, blind and holding the scale. The evidence needs to speak for itself. There needs to be independent research done that does not have the residue of any kind of drug, food or beverage companies. It should be done with true science and true testing, where science is living up to what it’s supposed to be. That’s long gone, so we need to come back to that.
NYC MOVIE GURU: Have there been any talks to make a narrative feature film about The Gerson Therapy?
SK: Firefly Productions in the UK is making a $40 million movie [about it]. They want Daniel Craig to play Dr. Max Gerson, they’re approaching Rachel Weisz to play Charlotte Gerson and they’re pushing Ron Howard to direct it. The production company is so afraid that they’re going to be accused of bias by contacting the Gerson family or giving us a single penny. The Gerson family has warned them that they are in for quite the ride if they tackle this movie.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
Friday, September 23, 2011
Zakary Zide talks about his inspiration for the "EarthDance Short Attention Span Environmental Film Festival"
The EarthDance Short-Attention-Span Environmental Film Collection features an award-winning collection of the most inspiring, provocative, passionate, playful and funny environmental stories this side of a three-toed sloth.
Complete with hand drawn and computer animations, documentaries, action adventures and comedies, the EarthDance Films Collection is both a serious and light-hearted exploration of nature, culture and environmental design. EarthDance is not your average film festival. I like that. And fortunately, it seems that other people like our quirkiness too! We've always believed that you shouldn't have to sacrifice entertainment for ecology. Our films are selected on the basis of being both entertaining and informative.
People like good stories, for good reason. I'm not a fan of sensationalism, but I do appreciate an entertaining story that has a meaningful message. I think this explains the popularity of such films as Super Size Me, and Michael Moore's documentaries. I think too many TV shows and films with important messages to tell get caught up in a scripted narrative, or else frighten or bore their audiences to death. There are so many different ways that people relate to the natural world - from the hunter or the vegetarian. I'm interested in telling everyone's story.
We intentionally cast a wide net. This is another reason why I felt like the Short-Attention-Span nature of the film fest was essential - variety. People's time is short and as great of a film as Who Killed the Electric Car is, not everyone wants to sit through 90 minutes of one eco-themed story. We wanted to include more people and expand the conversation. We've found that people really appreciate our variety. We often hear that our collection is "not what we expected, and that's a good thing." We look for personal stories that have not been told before; quirky, inspirational, and generally non-political. And of course, they have to be 30 seconds to 30 minutes in length.
EarthDance Films has been a real gift in my life. It has given me a chance to meet and work with incredibly talented people and interesting audiences from all over the world. It has also made me a better curator and editor. I am grateful for the opportunity to help build community and (hopefully) inspire some people along the way!
--Zak Zide
People like good stories, for good reason. I'm not a fan of sensationalism, but I do appreciate an entertaining story that has a meaningful message. I think this explains the popularity of such films as Super Size Me, and Michael Moore's documentaries. I think too many TV shows and films with important messages to tell get caught up in a scripted narrative, or else frighten or bore their audiences to death. There are so many different ways that people relate to the natural world - from the hunter or the vegetarian. I'm interested in telling everyone's story.
We intentionally cast a wide net. This is another reason why I felt like the Short-Attention-Span nature of the film fest was essential - variety. People's time is short and as great of a film as Who Killed the Electric Car is, not everyone wants to sit through 90 minutes of one eco-themed story. We wanted to include more people and expand the conversation. We've found that people really appreciate our variety. We often hear that our collection is "not what we expected, and that's a good thing." We look for personal stories that have not been told before; quirky, inspirational, and generally non-political. And of course, they have to be 30 seconds to 30 minutes in length.
EarthDance Films has been a real gift in my life. It has given me a chance to meet and work with incredibly talented people and interesting audiences from all over the world. It has also made me a better curator and editor. I am grateful for the opportunity to help build community and (hopefully) inspire some people along the way!
--Zak Zide
Wednesday, August 17, 2011
Director's Statement from Singeli Agnew and Joshua Fisher about "Pollen Nation"
From the beginning, we were interested in the idea of a science film that felt more like an American road movie. It was also clear to us that this was not just a story about bees and a little known migratory subculture, but a much larger tale about agriculture, and the human relationship with the natural world.
We started Pollen Nation in the fall of 2006, well before the news of a great bee die-off swept through the media. In the middle of production, two of our characters - Jeff Anderson and Dave Hackenberg - lost a substantial number of hives to what later became known as colony collapse disorder. We were suddenly in the midst of a national story, one which had been developing for years but which most people thought was brand new. Meanwhile the beekeepers had their heads in their hives simply trying to keep themselves in business. For many, this was just another setback in a long string of troubles.
What struck us about the news, and the public anxiety that followed, is that there was a great focus on finding a single culprit. After delving into the issues it was clear that there was not an isolated solution – identifying a pest, eliminating GM crops or a specific pesticide. This was a chronic problem, intimately connected to the demands of industrial agriculture that sustain our food economy. The beekeepers, in their struggle to keep their businesses alive, are caught in a cycle of short-term fixes that is leading to the long-term collapse of the honeybee. And modern agriculture, with its emphasis on efficiency and profit, has exploited the natural interactions that sustain it to the breaking point.
Monday, July 25, 2011
Director's Statement from Robert Greenwald about "Rethink Afghanistan"
It started with a holiday trip to Vietnam, in December of 2008.
As I usually do, I spent hours deciding which books to take. Among the first to make the cut was The Best and the Brightest, David Halberstam’s 1969 bestseller about the folly of our military action there.
As our family traveled through Vietnam and saw the sights, we talked to the people and began to understand, viscerally, the impact our war and policy had on the Vietnamese people and culture. It was surreal for the adults among us to be visiting, as tourists, places whose names we remembered from nightly newscasts that featured military pronouncements and body counts: Saigon, Da Nang, Hanoi. In Hanoi, we celebrated Christmas Eve among thousands of locals on motor bikes, shouting, singing, waving flags and generally embracing the “Santa Claus” consumerism of our holiday.
It felt surreal as well to be reading Halberstam’s book, which, despite its publication date, began to seem frighteningly prescient about our country’s current military involvements. The Best and the Brightest details the mistakes made by smart leaders who failed to consider history, overestimated our supposed military superiority, and stubbornly insisted on strategies and tactics that failed to take into account how the people of an invaded country view the occupiers—A policy that was guided by a mistaken notion about international communism and the Domino Theory.
When I returned to Los Angeles with page after page of the book underlined, I began to read the stories about Afghanistan in a new light. I began to worry, deeply, about our new administration’s plan to send more troops to that country, to escalate the war and “finish the job” that had been sidetracked by the “wrong war” in Iraq.
This was not the policy of a “change” administration.
This was not the policy that would lead to the better and more hopeful world we wanted.
This was NOT going to make us safer and more secure.
My colleagues at Brave New Films and I began extended debates and conversations. We were not getting fundamental questions answered, such as: How many troops? How long? At what cost? How do we get out? What is the end game? Is this really the way to deal with terrorists? Why invade the sovereign country of Afghanistan when the enemy is Al-Qaeda?
We came to believe very strongly that these questions had to be asked, and they had to be asked of this president, Barack Obama, whom so many had worked so hard to put into office. And they had to be asked now.
Our way to raise questions and raise issues is through our work in media. So, Rethink Afghanistan was born. We wanted to raise the key conceptual questions. We wanted to activate people. We wanted to provide information.
And we wanted to do this with Afghan people–Afghan experts who are on the ground, in country–in the film. One of the many tragedies of the Iraq War was the fact that Iraqis themselves were often invisible to us Americans. We vowed not to let that happen.
Almost as soon as we began, we were attacked by friends and allies. No one wanted to question the new administration’s plans. Many people still believed the war in Afghanistan was a just war, the right war. We lost funding. But we continued.
My trip to Afghanistan in March further reinforced our concerns about the advisability of our country’s military strategy. It was more than obvious to me, bumping over the dirt roads of Kabul in the third poorest country in the world, that the solutions to social, political and economic problems are not military solutions.
We pushed ahead without funding. We could not afford to wait until a full-length film was finished. We were simultaneously fundraising, filming, interviewing and editing. We then posted sections online as soon as we could finish them.
We built each section of the film around key issues:
1. The Troops – We laid out the arguments and information to make clear that more troops would not solve the deep-seated problems of Afghanistan.
2. Pakistan – We needed people to understand the critical role of Pakistan to everything in the region. It was important to gain a sense of Pakistan’s views of its own national interest. The world can’t only be seen through United States eyes.
3. Cost – As the economy got worse, the economic arguments against the escalating costs of war got stronger and more potent.
4. Women – Many strong progressive allies were so blindsided by the awful things the Taliban were doing to women; they were missing the large picture that this was not (in the words of Tom Hayden) “a war to protect feminists.” The Karzai government and its warlord allies were responsible for terrible attacks and destruction, and the many women in Afghanistan we interviewed made this very clear. They wanted the troops out.
5. Civilian Casualties – A young Afghan man tracked me down through Facebook and insisted on meeting me at the airport as I was about to fly out of Kabul. He gave me devastating video footage of a refugee father offering to sell his young daughter because he couldn’t care for her. There was much more similar footage. Between my interviews, the news footage, and this footage, we created another section.
6. Security – National security is the core fundamental argument for the war among those who support it. As Halberstam says over and over, Vietnam was a tragedy both militarily and politically because people didn’t challenge the assumption that “all communists are the same.” All communists are not the same, and all so-called “terrorists” are not the same. We missed numerous opportunities in Vietnam to negotiate peace because of our simple minded view of communism. In this section seasoned former CIA experts challenge the notion that this war for national security is making us safer. They argue that our fundamental misreading of terrorism is making us less secure as we create more people willing to attack us every day.
7. Solutions – We wanted to provide some simple, common sense stories of people doing what is really needed in Afghanistan: creating jobs, running schools, and providing medical care. We chose the few that we could quickly get on camera, but there are still many more.
Thank you for supporting Brave New Foundation and thank you for your efforts in spreading the word to Rethink Afghanistan.
Robert Greenwald
As I usually do, I spent hours deciding which books to take. Among the first to make the cut was The Best and the Brightest, David Halberstam’s 1969 bestseller about the folly of our military action there.
As our family traveled through Vietnam and saw the sights, we talked to the people and began to understand, viscerally, the impact our war and policy had on the Vietnamese people and culture. It was surreal for the adults among us to be visiting, as tourists, places whose names we remembered from nightly newscasts that featured military pronouncements and body counts: Saigon, Da Nang, Hanoi. In Hanoi, we celebrated Christmas Eve among thousands of locals on motor bikes, shouting, singing, waving flags and generally embracing the “Santa Claus” consumerism of our holiday.
It felt surreal as well to be reading Halberstam’s book, which, despite its publication date, began to seem frighteningly prescient about our country’s current military involvements. The Best and the Brightest details the mistakes made by smart leaders who failed to consider history, overestimated our supposed military superiority, and stubbornly insisted on strategies and tactics that failed to take into account how the people of an invaded country view the occupiers—A policy that was guided by a mistaken notion about international communism and the Domino Theory.
When I returned to Los Angeles with page after page of the book underlined, I began to read the stories about Afghanistan in a new light. I began to worry, deeply, about our new administration’s plan to send more troops to that country, to escalate the war and “finish the job” that had been sidetracked by the “wrong war” in Iraq.
This was not the policy of a “change” administration.
This was not the policy that would lead to the better and more hopeful world we wanted.
This was NOT going to make us safer and more secure.
My colleagues at Brave New Films and I began extended debates and conversations. We were not getting fundamental questions answered, such as: How many troops? How long? At what cost? How do we get out? What is the end game? Is this really the way to deal with terrorists? Why invade the sovereign country of Afghanistan when the enemy is Al-Qaeda?
We came to believe very strongly that these questions had to be asked, and they had to be asked of this president, Barack Obama, whom so many had worked so hard to put into office. And they had to be asked now.
Our way to raise questions and raise issues is through our work in media. So, Rethink Afghanistan was born. We wanted to raise the key conceptual questions. We wanted to activate people. We wanted to provide information.
And we wanted to do this with Afghan people–Afghan experts who are on the ground, in country–in the film. One of the many tragedies of the Iraq War was the fact that Iraqis themselves were often invisible to us Americans. We vowed not to let that happen.
Almost as soon as we began, we were attacked by friends and allies. No one wanted to question the new administration’s plans. Many people still believed the war in Afghanistan was a just war, the right war. We lost funding. But we continued.
My trip to Afghanistan in March further reinforced our concerns about the advisability of our country’s military strategy. It was more than obvious to me, bumping over the dirt roads of Kabul in the third poorest country in the world, that the solutions to social, political and economic problems are not military solutions.
We pushed ahead without funding. We could not afford to wait until a full-length film was finished. We were simultaneously fundraising, filming, interviewing and editing. We then posted sections online as soon as we could finish them.
We built each section of the film around key issues:
1. The Troops – We laid out the arguments and information to make clear that more troops would not solve the deep-seated problems of Afghanistan.
2. Pakistan – We needed people to understand the critical role of Pakistan to everything in the region. It was important to gain a sense of Pakistan’s views of its own national interest. The world can’t only be seen through United States eyes.
3. Cost – As the economy got worse, the economic arguments against the escalating costs of war got stronger and more potent.
4. Women – Many strong progressive allies were so blindsided by the awful things the Taliban were doing to women; they were missing the large picture that this was not (in the words of Tom Hayden) “a war to protect feminists.” The Karzai government and its warlord allies were responsible for terrible attacks and destruction, and the many women in Afghanistan we interviewed made this very clear. They wanted the troops out.
5. Civilian Casualties – A young Afghan man tracked me down through Facebook and insisted on meeting me at the airport as I was about to fly out of Kabul. He gave me devastating video footage of a refugee father offering to sell his young daughter because he couldn’t care for her. There was much more similar footage. Between my interviews, the news footage, and this footage, we created another section.
6. Security – National security is the core fundamental argument for the war among those who support it. As Halberstam says over and over, Vietnam was a tragedy both militarily and politically because people didn’t challenge the assumption that “all communists are the same.” All communists are not the same, and all so-called “terrorists” are not the same. We missed numerous opportunities in Vietnam to negotiate peace because of our simple minded view of communism. In this section seasoned former CIA experts challenge the notion that this war for national security is making us safer. They argue that our fundamental misreading of terrorism is making us less secure as we create more people willing to attack us every day.
7. Solutions – We wanted to provide some simple, common sense stories of people doing what is really needed in Afghanistan: creating jobs, running schools, and providing medical care. We chose the few that we could quickly get on camera, but there are still many more.
Thank you for supporting Brave New Foundation and thank you for your efforts in spreading the word to Rethink Afghanistan.
Robert Greenwald
Monday, June 13, 2011
Q and A with Andrew Nisker, Director of Chemerical
Q: What inspired you to make this film?
A: “The inspiration for Chemerical came from research I did during the production of Garbage! The Revolution Starts at Home. In that film I had a family keep their waste for three months to connect the dots between the pollution we create at home and to show how their lifestyle affects
the environment.”
“One of the areas we explored, for Garbage!, was the effects that cleaning products have on our water and the environment. Through that analysis we discovered that waste water and air quality in the family home are affected by cleaning and personal care products. I thought this subject alone was worthy of further examination and I came up with the idea to have another family rid their home of all toxic cleaners and personal care products and figure out how to live without them or make their own.”
Q: What are some of the issues you discovered with these products?
A: “Well, I just looked at the labels. I saw what was in these products and I started to do research on all the common ingredients. Why are they in there? What do they do? However, the majority of the products don’t list their ingredients so I had dig elsewhere to find most of that information.”
“One of the great resources I found was the cosmetics database (www.cosmeticsdatabase.com) online, which is an incredible web resource. It goes behind the scenes to explore the ingredients in your personal care products.”
“In the process of doing the research, we discovered a tremendous amount of these chemicals are rushed to market and they’re self regulated, which means the government doesn’t require corporations to submit the chemicals for testing. In our society, it’s good enough for these companies to just say that these chemicals are safe for human use. We tend not to ask questions.”
“Some of these chemicals, such as ammonia and chlorine, were initially developed for industrial purposes. Chlorine and Ammonia were mixed together to form Chlormine Gas as a chemical weapon used in the First World War. After the war there were stockpiles of these chemicals and scientists had to figure out ways to repurpose them so they started infusing them in cleaning products.”
“Before the introduction of these chemicals in our homes we used simple products like vinegar, water, lemon, baking soda and salt.”
Q: How hard was it to find a family to volunteer for three months and rid themselves of all their cleaners?
A: “It wasn’t that hard at all actually. We were on TV promoting Garbage! and mentioned that our next film was going to be focused on chemicals in the home. We had hundreds of families respond to us, via email so we put on Craigslist to find families. These families submitted video auditions to showcase all of the toxic products they keep in their homes, and we ended up choosing the Goode’s because that had a tremendous amount of these products and were also a fun group of people.”
Q: Were there any exceptions on what sort of chemicals they had to remove from their home?
A: “We didn’t go hardcore. Chemicals are good and bad, so we like to say they removed “toxins” from their home. When it came to personal care and cleaning products, we got rid of everything. We introduced them to people who could help them replace the products with natural and homemade alternatives. At the end of the process the family felt better physically, and were happy with the money they saved.”
“They made their own dishwashing and laundry soap, window cleaner, deodorant, toothpaste and shampoo. Strangely enough, the majority of these things were all made with the same ingredients.”
“- And guess what, they didn’t lose any friends in the process. They smelled good and felt good!”
“It’s a funny thing, and we talk about this in the movie, but we’ve become accustomed to smelling like things we actually aren’t. A couple hundred years ago people would rarely take baths. They’d wash their hands and in order to look clean and neat they’d wear pressed, clean, white linen and change their clothes when they got dirty. They were afraid to take baths because they though the hot water would open their pores and let in diseases and germs. Our natural smells were common back then but today we’ve gotten used to smelling like something from another planet. We don’t smell like human beings as Katherine Ashenberg tells us in the movie.”
Q: What did the family do after filming finished?
A: “They’ve stuck with it, but it’s only been a few months. Time will tell.”
Q: What sort of devices do you use in the film to get your message across?
A: “We created the Chemerical brand, which is a combination of the words chemical, America, and miracle. We thought this film would be an opportunity for people to re-think the way they clean their homes, and it would be our opportunity to re-brand the way we all clean. After all, the way we clean and learn to clean has been shaped by how everything is marketed, which started in the 1940s.”
“The creation of the soap opera brought an avalanche of cleaning ads into the home, targeted at housewives.”
“We have animation in the film, and what we’ve done is gone back to the old cartoon ads, that used to pitch cleaning products in the home, and we’ve given them a fresh look. We’ve created a new Chemerical family with a new pitch person, and we’re re-defining clean for a new generation throughout the film.”
“These ads are a tongue-in-cheek ode to the way we clean. For example, the revolutionary new Chemerical air freshener is called OTW, which simply stands for Open The Window.”
“There are other products we’re pitching throughout the film that are just as simple, oldfashioned ways of cleaning: vinegar, water, baking soda and essential oils. That’s it. That’s the way Chemerical cleans.”
“It’s a counter-reaction to the over-saturation of the cleaning market, to which we’ve been subjected to for the past 60 years.”
Q: What’s the target audience for Chemerical?
A: “Similar to Garbage! The Revolution Starts at Home, we feel Chemerical will appeal to a broad audience, especially those of us who take care of the cleaning in our homes, and all of us who use some sort of commercialized form of personal care product.”
“Chemerical makes you question the usefulness of the ingredients inside your products and how at the end of the day using these products 24/7 could have an adverse effect on your health. So I concluded, why take the chance and use products full of toxic ingredients when it’s far safer for you and your family to go natural. It does the same job yet it doesn’t hurt you or the environment.”
Q: Do you show how to make these natural cleaners in the film?
A: “Yes. As I mentioned earlier, the Goode family made all their own personal cleaning products, and we follow along as they do it, to see how it turns out.” “We’re also going to be releasing a Chemerical cookbook. I know it sounds strange, but yes, making cleaning products is kind of like cooking. You add a dash of lemon and some water and vinegar and it’s as simple of making a jug of lemonade, or in the case of making lipstick, like mixing up a batch of caramel or cookies. For example all that’s really in lipstick is wax, oil and natural coloring.”
“The cookbook will be offered with the film, and it’ll show you how to make these products.”
Q: What’s next for you?
A: “Hopefully a vacation!”
A: “The inspiration for Chemerical came from research I did during the production of Garbage! The Revolution Starts at Home. In that film I had a family keep their waste for three months to connect the dots between the pollution we create at home and to show how their lifestyle affects
the environment.”
“One of the areas we explored, for Garbage!, was the effects that cleaning products have on our water and the environment. Through that analysis we discovered that waste water and air quality in the family home are affected by cleaning and personal care products. I thought this subject alone was worthy of further examination and I came up with the idea to have another family rid their home of all toxic cleaners and personal care products and figure out how to live without them or make their own.”
Q: What are some of the issues you discovered with these products?
A: “Well, I just looked at the labels. I saw what was in these products and I started to do research on all the common ingredients. Why are they in there? What do they do? However, the majority of the products don’t list their ingredients so I had dig elsewhere to find most of that information.”
“One of the great resources I found was the cosmetics database (www.cosmeticsdatabase.com) online, which is an incredible web resource. It goes behind the scenes to explore the ingredients in your personal care products.”
“In the process of doing the research, we discovered a tremendous amount of these chemicals are rushed to market and they’re self regulated, which means the government doesn’t require corporations to submit the chemicals for testing. In our society, it’s good enough for these companies to just say that these chemicals are safe for human use. We tend not to ask questions.”
“Some of these chemicals, such as ammonia and chlorine, were initially developed for industrial purposes. Chlorine and Ammonia were mixed together to form Chlormine Gas as a chemical weapon used in the First World War. After the war there were stockpiles of these chemicals and scientists had to figure out ways to repurpose them so they started infusing them in cleaning products.”
“Before the introduction of these chemicals in our homes we used simple products like vinegar, water, lemon, baking soda and salt.”
Q: How hard was it to find a family to volunteer for three months and rid themselves of all their cleaners?
A: “It wasn’t that hard at all actually. We were on TV promoting Garbage! and mentioned that our next film was going to be focused on chemicals in the home. We had hundreds of families respond to us, via email so we put on Craigslist to find families. These families submitted video auditions to showcase all of the toxic products they keep in their homes, and we ended up choosing the Goode’s because that had a tremendous amount of these products and were also a fun group of people.”
Q: Were there any exceptions on what sort of chemicals they had to remove from their home?
A: “We didn’t go hardcore. Chemicals are good and bad, so we like to say they removed “toxins” from their home. When it came to personal care and cleaning products, we got rid of everything. We introduced them to people who could help them replace the products with natural and homemade alternatives. At the end of the process the family felt better physically, and were happy with the money they saved.”
“They made their own dishwashing and laundry soap, window cleaner, deodorant, toothpaste and shampoo. Strangely enough, the majority of these things were all made with the same ingredients.”
“- And guess what, they didn’t lose any friends in the process. They smelled good and felt good!”
“It’s a funny thing, and we talk about this in the movie, but we’ve become accustomed to smelling like things we actually aren’t. A couple hundred years ago people would rarely take baths. They’d wash their hands and in order to look clean and neat they’d wear pressed, clean, white linen and change their clothes when they got dirty. They were afraid to take baths because they though the hot water would open their pores and let in diseases and germs. Our natural smells were common back then but today we’ve gotten used to smelling like something from another planet. We don’t smell like human beings as Katherine Ashenberg tells us in the movie.”
Q: What did the family do after filming finished?
A: “They’ve stuck with it, but it’s only been a few months. Time will tell.”
Q: What sort of devices do you use in the film to get your message across?
A: “We created the Chemerical brand, which is a combination of the words chemical, America, and miracle. We thought this film would be an opportunity for people to re-think the way they clean their homes, and it would be our opportunity to re-brand the way we all clean. After all, the way we clean and learn to clean has been shaped by how everything is marketed, which started in the 1940s.”
“The creation of the soap opera brought an avalanche of cleaning ads into the home, targeted at housewives.”
“We have animation in the film, and what we’ve done is gone back to the old cartoon ads, that used to pitch cleaning products in the home, and we’ve given them a fresh look. We’ve created a new Chemerical family with a new pitch person, and we’re re-defining clean for a new generation throughout the film.”
“These ads are a tongue-in-cheek ode to the way we clean. For example, the revolutionary new Chemerical air freshener is called OTW, which simply stands for Open The Window.”
“There are other products we’re pitching throughout the film that are just as simple, oldfashioned ways of cleaning: vinegar, water, baking soda and essential oils. That’s it. That’s the way Chemerical cleans.”
“It’s a counter-reaction to the over-saturation of the cleaning market, to which we’ve been subjected to for the past 60 years.”
Q: What’s the target audience for Chemerical?
A: “Similar to Garbage! The Revolution Starts at Home, we feel Chemerical will appeal to a broad audience, especially those of us who take care of the cleaning in our homes, and all of us who use some sort of commercialized form of personal care product.”
“Chemerical makes you question the usefulness of the ingredients inside your products and how at the end of the day using these products 24/7 could have an adverse effect on your health. So I concluded, why take the chance and use products full of toxic ingredients when it’s far safer for you and your family to go natural. It does the same job yet it doesn’t hurt you or the environment.”
Q: Do you show how to make these natural cleaners in the film?
A: “Yes. As I mentioned earlier, the Goode family made all their own personal cleaning products, and we follow along as they do it, to see how it turns out.” “We’re also going to be releasing a Chemerical cookbook. I know it sounds strange, but yes, making cleaning products is kind of like cooking. You add a dash of lemon and some water and vinegar and it’s as simple of making a jug of lemonade, or in the case of making lipstick, like mixing up a batch of caramel or cookies. For example all that’s really in lipstick is wax, oil and natural coloring.”
“The cookbook will be offered with the film, and it’ll show you how to make these products.”
Q: What’s next for you?
A: “Hopefully a vacation!”
Friday, May 13, 2011
Director's Statement from Mark Achbar about "The Corporation"
My father was a successful small businessman, so I personally have had a life of relative privilege because of the financial circumstances of my family. I've always felt an obligation to try to use that privilege responsibly. In addition, filmmakers are very fortunate here in Canada, with (diminishing) public funding available to us and editorial freedom.
My overriding objective in making The Corporation was to challenge conventional wisdom about the role of the corporation in society, to make the commonplace seem strange, to alienate viewers from the normalcy of the dominant culture, allowing them to gain a critical distance on the corporations and the corporate culture that envelop us all.
When it comes to the fate of the Earth, I don't believe in legitimizing destructive forces by validating their perspective in a "balanced" TV-style journalism format. But I am interested in and, frankly, fascinated by the advocates of economic globalization and corporate dominance. It is essential, in a program of corporate literacy, to hear from them, and to understand their perspective. Reform comes from within as well as without, which is why The Corporation also tries to expose the institutional constraints many good people working inside big corporations struggle with.
-- Mark Achbar
Wednesday, April 20, 2011
Director's Statement from Philippe Diaz about "The End of Poverty"
When we were contacted by a member of the board of the Robert Schalkenbach Foundation and asked about our interest in making a film on poverty, several questions rushed to my mind. First, could it be more than simply "a" film on poverty? Could it be a film which would explain the true causes of poverty and moreover, the true historical and political causes of poverty?
The second question was: Are we ready to invest time, money and years of our lives to such a noble but seemingly impossible cause? This answer came quickly: 'yes' on all fronts. We created Cinema Libre Studio with the idea that movies can make a difference. And for the last six years we have produced and distributed movies to that effect.
On a personal level it was the same: I had started making movies when I was 13 and then studied the philosophy of art as well as political philosophy at La Sorbonne in Paris, instilling in me the belief that movies could make a difference in the world. As a young producer in Paris, most of the 25+ feature films I had made tackled world issues in one way or another. In 1999, I had returned to directing for Nouvel Ordre Mondial (Quelque Part en Afrique)( The Empire in Africa) a feature-length documentary that explains that famine and hunger are not a natural phenomenon, as many people believe, but rather a political one. We chose to film in Sierra Leone, which had been embroiled in a terrible civil war for nine years. We were there for a month. (Even if it was the most difficult experience in my life, it prepared me for this new assignment.) The success and impact of this film, which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in 2000 and went on to garner many awards around the world, encouraged me to use documentaries as tools to make a difference.
So of course the answer was, 'yes'. I had spent most of my life using movies to try to make a difference in the world. After the screening of The Empire in Africa during the Cannes Film Festival a journalist asked me: "Why would you take so much risk to make a film?" I answered: because I am probably not courageous enough to take a weapon and fight against injustice like many people do, so I take a camera, it feels safer!
And of course this film is about injustice…and inequalities which grow wider and wider every year, and about answering the daunting question: Why, in a world of so much wealth, do we still have so much poverty, where billions of people live on less than one dollar a day? (This is also the introduction to the film as narrated by the wonderful Martin Sheen.)
In developing the concept for a poverty film, many other questions came to mind: Why is it that when we make all these technological advancements the poor grow poorer? Why, if we find more and more wealth every year, do the poor grow poorer? Why, when a company makes huge profits that their shareholders pocket, do the employees pay the price when that company fails yet the shareholders retain their profits? Why are the natural resources given to us by nature exploited -- to the extent of destroying the planet - by only a few people who reap the benefits while millions of others suffer as a consequence? It was clear to me that making this film would be a wonderful opportunity to dig deep into a system that has created so much suffering, a system which is still almost deified by so many.
After months of research, discussions and several proposals, the Foundation allowed me to expand the scope of the film beyond a narrow Georgist perspective, in order to explain the true historical and political causes of poverty in the world. Ultimately the goal of the film was to change the dialogue around the poverty debate from "poverty is a shame," to "poverty exists for a reason."
When we finalized the budget, it was clear that we would have to limit our travel to a few countries. That coupled with the fact that the issue of poverty is remarkably complex, meant we also had to limit the scope of our investigation to a few specific topics.
The production would eventually entail over one hundred hours of interviews and bring us to four different continents: South America (Venezuela, Brazil, Bolivia), Africa (Kenya and Tanzania), Europe and North America. The criteria for the countries we chose were: countries with governments that were open to acknowledging and talking about the poverty challenges they faced; and secondly, countries that represented a specific issue in the thesis we were developing, such as land rights in Kenya. As absurd as it sounds, many Third World governments facing dire poverty are still ready to deny this even though one can see evidence on every street.
Originally I wanted to show both sides of the poverty debate. We even filmed several experts who were proponents of the "progress and technology will solve everything" mindset supporting the notion that mosquito nets and bags of fertilizer could solve the poverty conundrum. This is the theory that Bono's economic sidekick, Jeffrey Sachs, has touted all around the world. But the first cut of the film was more than three hours long, so many of these interviews were left on the hard drive of the editing system.
We decided to make the film with a small crew since we would be going into slums and the homes of poor people, which we knew to be small and crowded. Our itinerary was punishing and we planned to move fast and visit multiple cities in several countries, which required mobility.
The form of the documentary was of particular importance to me, not as much as the content of course, but we were going with a mission to change people's perception of the true causes of poverty. It was essential nevertheless because I saw too many documentaries ruined by their lack of form or too much of it. The stars of the film had to be the poor. And I knew that I couldn’t turn such a devastating subject into "cinema." I would therefore have to refrain from using zooms and any other effects unless they were absolutely necessary to the context of the scene. The camera would be mostly fixed on a tripod or handheld when necessary. I would create a totally different feel for the experts who would be interviewed in natural settings: it is easier to fight poverty from a comfortable office in a university or an international organization – which doesn't diminish the importance of what these experts who do – but it is another to live it on a day-to-day basis. To wake up hungry everyday without knowing where you can find enough money during the day to feed your family is simply not the same thing.
I decided early on that lighting choices would be my ally in this complex cinematic question. I would install my experts in a comfortable setting and light them with three to four light sources, ultimately using diffusion and colored gels. When filming those living in poverty we would use natural light, which very often, was almost non-existent. I also decided to shoot the poor subjects with a handheld camera, allowing me to follow behind them when they were showing us their miserable living conditions – unless the subject was seated. Our experts would be shot with a fixed and immobile camera.
Our experience in working with these poor people brought us to a level of understanding I never thought possible. Many of them had an understanding of their situations and of its causes that most experts would find accurate beyond belief. But the experts opened our minds in a no less interesting way. We started shooting in 2006 and most of the experts predicted an imminent financial crisis which would engulf the world, while most of our politicians and our media were glorifying the prowess of capitalism. One of the experts, Serge Latouche, put it in very simple words: Today 20% of the planet uses more than 80% of its resources. Moreover, every year we are consuming 30% more than what the planet can regenerate, therefore digging a giant hole under our feet and making it bigger every year. And of course, these resources come primarily from the countries of the (global) South. And the most condemning part is that in order to maintain our lifestyle in the North, we have to keep these countries at a level of dire poverty. Even worse, because the world's population continues to increase in order to maintain our lifestyle we have to plunge more and more people into poverty every year. Latouche makes the point that if everybody had the same lifestyle as the people in North America, we would need six planets.
I summarize here the main points made in the film. The question is: how did this catch all of our top economists by surprise last October (2008) when the global economy imploded? They had no idea and no way to predict. Funny isn't it?
Ironically, in the last year our movie became the film to explain the current economic crisis while it was touring the festivals. The Critics' Week at the Cannes Film Festival, selected the film when it was not even finished which started an international festival tour that has passed the 25 mark and is still counting. I've been invited around the world to present the film and explain why we have to change our understanding and our perception of poor people and of poverty. Because at the end of the day, as long as we remain rich, they will remain poor and we'll keep digging the gigantic hole under our feet… which one day, without a doubt, will swallow us all.
But we have to hope that we are more intelligent than to let that happen.
The second question was: Are we ready to invest time, money and years of our lives to such a noble but seemingly impossible cause? This answer came quickly: 'yes' on all fronts. We created Cinema Libre Studio with the idea that movies can make a difference. And for the last six years we have produced and distributed movies to that effect.
On a personal level it was the same: I had started making movies when I was 13 and then studied the philosophy of art as well as political philosophy at La Sorbonne in Paris, instilling in me the belief that movies could make a difference in the world. As a young producer in Paris, most of the 25+ feature films I had made tackled world issues in one way or another. In 1999, I had returned to directing for Nouvel Ordre Mondial (Quelque Part en Afrique)( The Empire in Africa) a feature-length documentary that explains that famine and hunger are not a natural phenomenon, as many people believe, but rather a political one. We chose to film in Sierra Leone, which had been embroiled in a terrible civil war for nine years. We were there for a month. (Even if it was the most difficult experience in my life, it prepared me for this new assignment.) The success and impact of this film, which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in 2000 and went on to garner many awards around the world, encouraged me to use documentaries as tools to make a difference.
So of course the answer was, 'yes'. I had spent most of my life using movies to try to make a difference in the world. After the screening of The Empire in Africa during the Cannes Film Festival a journalist asked me: "Why would you take so much risk to make a film?" I answered: because I am probably not courageous enough to take a weapon and fight against injustice like many people do, so I take a camera, it feels safer!
And of course this film is about injustice…and inequalities which grow wider and wider every year, and about answering the daunting question: Why, in a world of so much wealth, do we still have so much poverty, where billions of people live on less than one dollar a day? (This is also the introduction to the film as narrated by the wonderful Martin Sheen.)
In developing the concept for a poverty film, many other questions came to mind: Why is it that when we make all these technological advancements the poor grow poorer? Why, if we find more and more wealth every year, do the poor grow poorer? Why, when a company makes huge profits that their shareholders pocket, do the employees pay the price when that company fails yet the shareholders retain their profits? Why are the natural resources given to us by nature exploited -- to the extent of destroying the planet - by only a few people who reap the benefits while millions of others suffer as a consequence? It was clear to me that making this film would be a wonderful opportunity to dig deep into a system that has created so much suffering, a system which is still almost deified by so many.
After months of research, discussions and several proposals, the Foundation allowed me to expand the scope of the film beyond a narrow Georgist perspective, in order to explain the true historical and political causes of poverty in the world. Ultimately the goal of the film was to change the dialogue around the poverty debate from "poverty is a shame," to "poverty exists for a reason."
When we finalized the budget, it was clear that we would have to limit our travel to a few countries. That coupled with the fact that the issue of poverty is remarkably complex, meant we also had to limit the scope of our investigation to a few specific topics.
The production would eventually entail over one hundred hours of interviews and bring us to four different continents: South America (Venezuela, Brazil, Bolivia), Africa (Kenya and Tanzania), Europe and North America. The criteria for the countries we chose were: countries with governments that were open to acknowledging and talking about the poverty challenges they faced; and secondly, countries that represented a specific issue in the thesis we were developing, such as land rights in Kenya. As absurd as it sounds, many Third World governments facing dire poverty are still ready to deny this even though one can see evidence on every street.
Originally I wanted to show both sides of the poverty debate. We even filmed several experts who were proponents of the "progress and technology will solve everything" mindset supporting the notion that mosquito nets and bags of fertilizer could solve the poverty conundrum. This is the theory that Bono's economic sidekick, Jeffrey Sachs, has touted all around the world. But the first cut of the film was more than three hours long, so many of these interviews were left on the hard drive of the editing system.
We decided to make the film with a small crew since we would be going into slums and the homes of poor people, which we knew to be small and crowded. Our itinerary was punishing and we planned to move fast and visit multiple cities in several countries, which required mobility.
The form of the documentary was of particular importance to me, not as much as the content of course, but we were going with a mission to change people's perception of the true causes of poverty. It was essential nevertheless because I saw too many documentaries ruined by their lack of form or too much of it. The stars of the film had to be the poor. And I knew that I couldn’t turn such a devastating subject into "cinema." I would therefore have to refrain from using zooms and any other effects unless they were absolutely necessary to the context of the scene. The camera would be mostly fixed on a tripod or handheld when necessary. I would create a totally different feel for the experts who would be interviewed in natural settings: it is easier to fight poverty from a comfortable office in a university or an international organization – which doesn't diminish the importance of what these experts who do – but it is another to live it on a day-to-day basis. To wake up hungry everyday without knowing where you can find enough money during the day to feed your family is simply not the same thing.
I decided early on that lighting choices would be my ally in this complex cinematic question. I would install my experts in a comfortable setting and light them with three to four light sources, ultimately using diffusion and colored gels. When filming those living in poverty we would use natural light, which very often, was almost non-existent. I also decided to shoot the poor subjects with a handheld camera, allowing me to follow behind them when they were showing us their miserable living conditions – unless the subject was seated. Our experts would be shot with a fixed and immobile camera.
Our experience in working with these poor people brought us to a level of understanding I never thought possible. Many of them had an understanding of their situations and of its causes that most experts would find accurate beyond belief. But the experts opened our minds in a no less interesting way. We started shooting in 2006 and most of the experts predicted an imminent financial crisis which would engulf the world, while most of our politicians and our media were glorifying the prowess of capitalism. One of the experts, Serge Latouche, put it in very simple words: Today 20% of the planet uses more than 80% of its resources. Moreover, every year we are consuming 30% more than what the planet can regenerate, therefore digging a giant hole under our feet and making it bigger every year. And of course, these resources come primarily from the countries of the (global) South. And the most condemning part is that in order to maintain our lifestyle in the North, we have to keep these countries at a level of dire poverty. Even worse, because the world's population continues to increase in order to maintain our lifestyle we have to plunge more and more people into poverty every year. Latouche makes the point that if everybody had the same lifestyle as the people in North America, we would need six planets.
I summarize here the main points made in the film. The question is: how did this catch all of our top economists by surprise last October (2008) when the global economy imploded? They had no idea and no way to predict. Funny isn't it?
Ironically, in the last year our movie became the film to explain the current economic crisis while it was touring the festivals. The Critics' Week at the Cannes Film Festival, selected the film when it was not even finished which started an international festival tour that has passed the 25 mark and is still counting. I've been invited around the world to present the film and explain why we have to change our understanding and our perception of poor people and of poverty. Because at the end of the day, as long as we remain rich, they will remain poor and we'll keep digging the gigantic hole under our feet… which one day, without a doubt, will swallow us all.
But we have to hope that we are more intelligent than to let that happen.
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Interview with Tim DePaepe, Director of Shades of Gray
Gray Matter
March 30, 2000
by Dan Lybarger
Originally appeared in the March 30-April 5, 2000 issue of Pitch Weekly.
"There were always eyebrows that went up when they said, 'What's your film about?' I'd say, 'Gay life in Kansas,'" recalls Shades of Gray director Tim DePaepe during a recent interview in Lawrence, Kan. "Three years ago, when I was in South By Southwest (a film festival in Austin, Texas) pitching this thing, showing the demo around, I remember one response I got from somebody was, 'How many gay people are there in Kansas? Three?' I hope that by making this film ... we would be showing the world that this is part of the Kansas landscape."
Shades of Gray, which debuts at the Tivoli Manor Square Theatre at 7 p.m. on Saturday, April 1, with another showing at 11:30 the next morning, depicts the state as an eclectic place and includes a wide variety of narratives. There are intimate talking-head interviews with three gay men and two lesbians, re-enactments of their personal stories, news footage, and comments from the vehemently homophobic Topeka pastor Fred Phelps. It also looks at Kansas' long history of civil rights struggles.
DePaepe explains, "We were a free state (during the Civil War), but at the same time we are the state that recently tried to repeal the teaching of evolution. Kansas is a dichotomy. It's always been a conflicted state. Look at what Janet (one of the featured subjects) says in the movie. When people think about Kansas, they think about Bob Dole. They don't think about gays, lesbians, or bisexuals. Anywhere but Kansas. That's how a lot (of Kansas) gays and lesbians grew up. It's a great conflict for this story."
DePaepe frames the elements of the film around the successful 1994 proposal to add the words "sexual orientation" to Lawrence's discrimination policies and the disputes it generated. "I just lucked out. It started around the time I started to make the film," he says. "You can't sit on the fence on this issue. There are no shades of gray in terms of tolerance or intolerance. The gray area is created by fear. I call the film Shades of Gray because you can see all the levels of this fear. You have Bob Moody (a Lawrence city council member) saying that you can't legislate tolerance; you can only educate against intolerance, and he's right. But yet at the same time, he's voting in opposition. Figure that one out."
Although Shades of Gray has yet to be shown to the general public, it has already attracted controversy. After receiving a thank-you letter and a tape of the film from DePaepe, Phelps sent a vitriolic fax threatening to picket the Tivoli screening. In the message the pastor calls DePaepe "a mendacious little pervert" and "a theologian come lately." DePaepe takes out the message, points to a grotesque cartoon of a bandaged man with swollen eyelids, and says, "That's (hate crime murder victim) Matthew Shepard. Honestly, I don't care what Fred thinks. But it wasn't until I got this (fax) in my hands that I said, 'Oh, my God. He's really going to be there.' I honestly thought he was going to ignore me and that I was too small-time for him. His ego's just tremendous. He's been interviewed all over the world (by people like) Dan Rather and Hugh Downs on 20/20. He's been featured in other national documentaries on hate groups. I think he is taking this personally.
"He's extremely intelligent and very articulate, very much a Southern gentleman. My mother's from the South, and I grew up a Southern Baptist too. It's something he and I had in common. In all reality, I have more in common with Fred, as a white, heterosexual man in Kansas who grew up as a Southern Baptist, than I do with (the film's gay subjects) Janet, Lea, Michael, Bill, or Ben. Ben's Jewish, and Janet and Michael are Catholic. The difference between me and Fred is that I don't hate people," DePaepe says.
If DePaepe's work has incurred Phelps' wrath, it also has received some prominent support. Michael Moore, the director of Roger and Me and The Big One and the host of the television programs TV Nation and The Awful Truth, helped finance the film. DePaepe recalls, "He was in (Lawrence) giving a lecture. They had a receiving line, and I walked up and got him to sign a poster, and I just said, 'Hi, my name's Tim, and I'm an independent filmmaker.' He said, 'What are you doing?' He had just talked about the banned segment of TV Nation on Fred Phelps. I said, 'I'm doing this film about gay life in Kansas.' His eyes kind of perked up, and he said, 'Really?' He stopped the line of people behind us. I gave him the quick one-minute pitch, and he said, 'What do you need? What can I do to help?' I said, 'I need $75,000 to finish the movie.' He said, 'Do you really need $75,000?'"
After telling Moore about how much he had shot and the equipment he was using, DePaepe recalls, "(Moore) said, 'Yeah, you'll need $75,000. I'll buy your next 20 rolls of film.' He's that cool. I've corresponded with him (but) I haven't heard what he thinks of the film."
DePaepe has devoted much of the past few years to Shades of Gray. He estimates that he shot approximately 52 hours of footage and can recite and imitate many of the comments from the film with eerie accuracy. "I can almost channel Ben," he chuckles. Still, DePaepe credits his fellow Midwesterners (particularly the Independent Filmmakers Coalition of Kansas City) for inspiration and support.
"A film is never one person's film, even though it says, 'A film by Tim DePaepe.' The only reason we do that is because one person has to sell the film." In addition to his work on Shades of Gray, DePaepe, who graduated from KU's Film Studies Program in 1990, has worked on projects as diverse as the movie Kansas and the television series Rescue 911. He also made the short documentary Quiet Passages and contributed an episode of the cable series Split Screen, which dealt with the banning of the movie The Tin Drum in Oklahoma. "It's enough to make some people return my phone calls," he says.
March 30, 2000
by Dan Lybarger
Originally appeared in the March 30-April 5, 2000 issue of Pitch Weekly.
"There were always eyebrows that went up when they said, 'What's your film about?' I'd say, 'Gay life in Kansas,'" recalls Shades of Gray director Tim DePaepe during a recent interview in Lawrence, Kan. "Three years ago, when I was in South By Southwest (a film festival in Austin, Texas) pitching this thing, showing the demo around, I remember one response I got from somebody was, 'How many gay people are there in Kansas? Three?' I hope that by making this film ... we would be showing the world that this is part of the Kansas landscape."
Shades of Gray, which debuts at the Tivoli Manor Square Theatre at 7 p.m. on Saturday, April 1, with another showing at 11:30 the next morning, depicts the state as an eclectic place and includes a wide variety of narratives. There are intimate talking-head interviews with three gay men and two lesbians, re-enactments of their personal stories, news footage, and comments from the vehemently homophobic Topeka pastor Fred Phelps. It also looks at Kansas' long history of civil rights struggles.
DePaepe explains, "We were a free state (during the Civil War), but at the same time we are the state that recently tried to repeal the teaching of evolution. Kansas is a dichotomy. It's always been a conflicted state. Look at what Janet (one of the featured subjects) says in the movie. When people think about Kansas, they think about Bob Dole. They don't think about gays, lesbians, or bisexuals. Anywhere but Kansas. That's how a lot (of Kansas) gays and lesbians grew up. It's a great conflict for this story."
DePaepe frames the elements of the film around the successful 1994 proposal to add the words "sexual orientation" to Lawrence's discrimination policies and the disputes it generated. "I just lucked out. It started around the time I started to make the film," he says. "You can't sit on the fence on this issue. There are no shades of gray in terms of tolerance or intolerance. The gray area is created by fear. I call the film Shades of Gray because you can see all the levels of this fear. You have Bob Moody (a Lawrence city council member) saying that you can't legislate tolerance; you can only educate against intolerance, and he's right. But yet at the same time, he's voting in opposition. Figure that one out."
Although Shades of Gray has yet to be shown to the general public, it has already attracted controversy. After receiving a thank-you letter and a tape of the film from DePaepe, Phelps sent a vitriolic fax threatening to picket the Tivoli screening. In the message the pastor calls DePaepe "a mendacious little pervert" and "a theologian come lately." DePaepe takes out the message, points to a grotesque cartoon of a bandaged man with swollen eyelids, and says, "That's (hate crime murder victim) Matthew Shepard. Honestly, I don't care what Fred thinks. But it wasn't until I got this (fax) in my hands that I said, 'Oh, my God. He's really going to be there.' I honestly thought he was going to ignore me and that I was too small-time for him. His ego's just tremendous. He's been interviewed all over the world (by people like) Dan Rather and Hugh Downs on 20/20. He's been featured in other national documentaries on hate groups. I think he is taking this personally.
"He's extremely intelligent and very articulate, very much a Southern gentleman. My mother's from the South, and I grew up a Southern Baptist too. It's something he and I had in common. In all reality, I have more in common with Fred, as a white, heterosexual man in Kansas who grew up as a Southern Baptist, than I do with (the film's gay subjects) Janet, Lea, Michael, Bill, or Ben. Ben's Jewish, and Janet and Michael are Catholic. The difference between me and Fred is that I don't hate people," DePaepe says.
If DePaepe's work has incurred Phelps' wrath, it also has received some prominent support. Michael Moore, the director of Roger and Me and The Big One and the host of the television programs TV Nation and The Awful Truth, helped finance the film. DePaepe recalls, "He was in (Lawrence) giving a lecture. They had a receiving line, and I walked up and got him to sign a poster, and I just said, 'Hi, my name's Tim, and I'm an independent filmmaker.' He said, 'What are you doing?' He had just talked about the banned segment of TV Nation on Fred Phelps. I said, 'I'm doing this film about gay life in Kansas.' His eyes kind of perked up, and he said, 'Really?' He stopped the line of people behind us. I gave him the quick one-minute pitch, and he said, 'What do you need? What can I do to help?' I said, 'I need $75,000 to finish the movie.' He said, 'Do you really need $75,000?'"
After telling Moore about how much he had shot and the equipment he was using, DePaepe recalls, "(Moore) said, 'Yeah, you'll need $75,000. I'll buy your next 20 rolls of film.' He's that cool. I've corresponded with him (but) I haven't heard what he thinks of the film."
DePaepe has devoted much of the past few years to Shades of Gray. He estimates that he shot approximately 52 hours of footage and can recite and imitate many of the comments from the film with eerie accuracy. "I can almost channel Ben," he chuckles. Still, DePaepe credits his fellow Midwesterners (particularly the Independent Filmmakers Coalition of Kansas City) for inspiration and support.
"A film is never one person's film, even though it says, 'A film by Tim DePaepe.' The only reason we do that is because one person has to sell the film." In addition to his work on Shades of Gray, DePaepe, who graduated from KU's Film Studies Program in 1990, has worked on projects as diverse as the movie Kansas and the television series Rescue 911. He also made the short documentary Quiet Passages and contributed an episode of the cable series Split Screen, which dealt with the banning of the movie The Tin Drum in Oklahoma. "It's enough to make some people return my phone calls," he says.
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Production Notes from Simon Burrow, Producer of Beyond Borders
I have been interested in immigration since the 1980’s when I first had factories in Mexico. But I was busy with other things, like making money, and didn’t do much about it except argue until a series of unlikely unrelated events happened in the first few years of the 2000’s. Some of them were books, some were observations and they all culminated in what I have to call an epiphany in the spring of 2005. I’ll write about the various roots first and them the epiphany.
• In 2003 I sold my business for enough money that I never had to work for money again. I was 56 years old.
• I heard Warren Buffett talk at Caltech. In his speech he mentioned the “ovarian lottery.” According to his idea, the way your life turns out is mostly a result of where you are born.
• I read Fewer a book about population trends by Ben Wattenberg that showed that the worlds population is stabilizing.
• I noticed that there were more stories in the US press about obesity than about starvation.
• I read The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell and realized that the immigration debate was reaching a tipping point.
• I heard Angelica Salas speak on the Al Rantel show on talk radio and was deeply moved by her calm assertion of the rights of migrants.
• I read Strangers No Longer a booklet written by the Catholic Church that stated “persons have the right to live where they choose..”
• I read in a novel by Alexander McCall Smith an idea that the ethics of a society adjust to the needs of the society.
• I read the story of the SS St Louis and the refugees from the Nazis who were not allowed into Cuba and the United States and
• I saw the movie Amazing Grace and saw the parallel between slavery in the 18th century and the right to migrate today.
All of these ideas were bashing around in my head in the May of 2005. I was driving through the desert near the Salton Sea and they synthesized.
• The worlds view on immigrants was based on a paradyme of shortages. We are entering an unprecedented time of prosperity and the rules will need to change.
• In a world of material surplus where people are in short supply we will adjust our ethics away from tribal xenophobia and toward welcoming.
• The ethic that says it is okay to discriminate against people based on where they were born is morally bankrupt.
• The world will be a better fairer place when people can vote with their feet and governments are forced to compete.
• There are ways that the settled people in an area can accept new settlers without slamming the door completely or being overwhelmed.
These ideas made me so excited I gave up my other avocations, teaching and sculpting, and began learning everything I could about the current immigration debate in the USA and around the world. By December of 2005 after struggling for a few months with how to promote my new idea I saw Bowling for Columbine by Michael Moore and thought I could make a documentary. And so I did.
The Story Evolves
When I set out to make this documentary I envisioned a story telling the history of human migration:
This is the original treatment:
Scene One ”It is the Right of the State”
In this scene it is 1730 in central Europe. There are two families huddled on the village green. A man in an official looking uniform is speaking to them “I’m sorry” he says “the King has ruled that you will not be allowed to settle in the kingdom. You will have to leave.”
Should be clearly wrong, ugly but not violent.
Scene Two “The SS St Louis Story”
The SS St Louis left Nazi Germany with 1000 passengers mostly Jewish women and children. It was bound for Cuba but was denied entry there and then in the USA and other nations. Finally it was forced to return to Europe where hundreds of the passengers died at the hands of the Nazis.
There is a independent film about this story. Get one of the survivors to speak.
Scene Three “Free to Live”
It is Detroit and a black family is being kept from living in an all white suburb.
There is an important movie and or book about this story.
Scene Four “Dying at Borders”
Black Africa. This scene shows the misery of the camps on the Rwanda border. Perhaps with voice over from an aid worker talking about how people were turned back to their deaths.
Scene Five “Dying in the Desert”
Perhaps a series of interviews with survivors of the US/Mexico crossing saying how risky the crossing was is and why they attempted it. Show video and stills of the death
Scene Six “A Call to Action”
Oppose vigilanties (show Minuteman videos)
The underground railroad analogy?
Civil Disobedience. Stop the Wall!
What we actually made was completely different. Part of that was a result of events. Who would have guessed that 1,000,000 people would march in the streets of Los Angeles in the spring of 2006 and that we would be able to film it. And part of it was a result of the people I hired to direct the film. The first paid professional I hired was Dave Szamet. His first task was to put together a budget for filming the treatment shown above. Dave made it sound possible and I plunged ahead we hired Justin Daniels to be the director for a test of the concept. With Seth Orozco behind the camera Dave and Justin shot local scenes for a few months and made a five minute short out of it.
It now was the summer of 2006 and it looked possible that we could make the film and the political climate made it urgent. Dave dug into his bag of contacts and we interviewed several potential directors with experience. We settled on Brian Ging and after Brian wrote a revised script we started shooting again in September. For the next year the shooting went on intermittently all of the crew had other jobs or school or both and everything we did was the first time we did it. We fought, we argued, we complained about money, the schedule, the content and the methodology. But finally it was finished. We were able to interview lots of very smart people for the film and to get them to talk about whether there is a basic human right to migrate. The “B roll” was collected in three countries and six states and was a constant source of friction.
• In 2003 I sold my business for enough money that I never had to work for money again. I was 56 years old.
• I heard Warren Buffett talk at Caltech. In his speech he mentioned the “ovarian lottery.” According to his idea, the way your life turns out is mostly a result of where you are born.
• I read Fewer a book about population trends by Ben Wattenberg that showed that the worlds population is stabilizing.
• I noticed that there were more stories in the US press about obesity than about starvation.
• I read The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell and realized that the immigration debate was reaching a tipping point.
• I heard Angelica Salas speak on the Al Rantel show on talk radio and was deeply moved by her calm assertion of the rights of migrants.
• I read Strangers No Longer a booklet written by the Catholic Church that stated “persons have the right to live where they choose..”
• I read in a novel by Alexander McCall Smith an idea that the ethics of a society adjust to the needs of the society.
• I read the story of the SS St Louis and the refugees from the Nazis who were not allowed into Cuba and the United States and
• I saw the movie Amazing Grace and saw the parallel between slavery in the 18th century and the right to migrate today.
All of these ideas were bashing around in my head in the May of 2005. I was driving through the desert near the Salton Sea and they synthesized.
• The worlds view on immigrants was based on a paradyme of shortages. We are entering an unprecedented time of prosperity and the rules will need to change.
• In a world of material surplus where people are in short supply we will adjust our ethics away from tribal xenophobia and toward welcoming.
• The ethic that says it is okay to discriminate against people based on where they were born is morally bankrupt.
• The world will be a better fairer place when people can vote with their feet and governments are forced to compete.
• There are ways that the settled people in an area can accept new settlers without slamming the door completely or being overwhelmed.
These ideas made me so excited I gave up my other avocations, teaching and sculpting, and began learning everything I could about the current immigration debate in the USA and around the world. By December of 2005 after struggling for a few months with how to promote my new idea I saw Bowling for Columbine by Michael Moore and thought I could make a documentary. And so I did.
The Story Evolves
When I set out to make this documentary I envisioned a story telling the history of human migration:
This is the original treatment:
Scene One ”It is the Right of the State”
In this scene it is 1730 in central Europe. There are two families huddled on the village green. A man in an official looking uniform is speaking to them “I’m sorry” he says “the King has ruled that you will not be allowed to settle in the kingdom. You will have to leave.”
Should be clearly wrong, ugly but not violent.
Scene Two “The SS St Louis Story”
The SS St Louis left Nazi Germany with 1000 passengers mostly Jewish women and children. It was bound for Cuba but was denied entry there and then in the USA and other nations. Finally it was forced to return to Europe where hundreds of the passengers died at the hands of the Nazis.
There is a independent film about this story. Get one of the survivors to speak.
Scene Three “Free to Live”
It is Detroit and a black family is being kept from living in an all white suburb.
There is an important movie and or book about this story.
Scene Four “Dying at Borders”
Black Africa. This scene shows the misery of the camps on the Rwanda border. Perhaps with voice over from an aid worker talking about how people were turned back to their deaths.
Scene Five “Dying in the Desert”
Perhaps a series of interviews with survivors of the US/Mexico crossing saying how risky the crossing was is and why they attempted it. Show video and stills of the death
Scene Six “A Call to Action”
Oppose vigilanties (show Minuteman videos)
The underground railroad analogy?
Civil Disobedience. Stop the Wall!
What we actually made was completely different. Part of that was a result of events. Who would have guessed that 1,000,000 people would march in the streets of Los Angeles in the spring of 2006 and that we would be able to film it. And part of it was a result of the people I hired to direct the film. The first paid professional I hired was Dave Szamet. His first task was to put together a budget for filming the treatment shown above. Dave made it sound possible and I plunged ahead we hired Justin Daniels to be the director for a test of the concept. With Seth Orozco behind the camera Dave and Justin shot local scenes for a few months and made a five minute short out of it.
It now was the summer of 2006 and it looked possible that we could make the film and the political climate made it urgent. Dave dug into his bag of contacts and we interviewed several potential directors with experience. We settled on Brian Ging and after Brian wrote a revised script we started shooting again in September. For the next year the shooting went on intermittently all of the crew had other jobs or school or both and everything we did was the first time we did it. We fought, we argued, we complained about money, the schedule, the content and the methodology. But finally it was finished. We were able to interview lots of very smart people for the film and to get them to talk about whether there is a basic human right to migrate. The “B roll” was collected in three countries and six states and was a constant source of friction.
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Q&A WITH FILMMAKER JOSH TICKELL OF FUEL
Q: What inspired you to make FUEL?
A: I made FUEL to show that there is a way for us to have all the energy we need without compromising peace and freedom.
Q: What were some of the challenges and obstacles in making this film, and how did you overcome them?
A: Ten years ago, when I set out to make this film, the biggest challenge I had was getting people to buy into the idea that a movie could make a significant contribution to the world. But my green community saw the validity of these ideas, and with their encouragement I have overcome many obstacles along the way. Until recently, documentaries weren’t seen as vehicles for social change. That rapidly changed with Fahrenheit 9/11, Supersize Me, Born into Brothels and especially with An Inconvenient Truth. Suddenly, the little energy documentary I’d been working on for a decade became hot. By the end of this year when the film will be presented in theaters all over the country, the ideas and concepts in FUEL will become mainstream. That’s a powerful shift.
Q: How did your vision for the film change over the course of the pre-production, production and post-production processes?
A: I wanted to make a film about the serious challenges we face and ultimately about the power of every individual to make a difference. The biggest challenge came after we won the audience award at Sundance. It was at that time that two camps emerged - those that loved biofuels and those that thought biofuels were awful. I made the difficult choice to re-cut the movie to incorporate not just the controversy around biofuels, but also the other energy solutions that exist. Like any renovation, we started re-cutting with an eye toward repairing a few flaws and ended up knee deep in a complete re-edit. The film that emerged kept the heart of the original movie, but was different enough in content and scope that it merited a new name and a new launch. Hence FUEL was born. Everyone who has seen both films agrees that it was worth the risk, the time and the energy to make the new movie.
Q: What is next for you?
A: My team and I are taking the film on a 25-city tour across the United States this year. We will travel in a convoy of biodiesel vehicles that will go to universities, schools, town halls and political events. Our goal is to “green the vote” of America by getting everyday people, along with politicians and energy companies, to sign onto a 10-year plan that will transition America to renewable energy.
A: I made FUEL to show that there is a way for us to have all the energy we need without compromising peace and freedom.
Q: What were some of the challenges and obstacles in making this film, and how did you overcome them?
A: Ten years ago, when I set out to make this film, the biggest challenge I had was getting people to buy into the idea that a movie could make a significant contribution to the world. But my green community saw the validity of these ideas, and with their encouragement I have overcome many obstacles along the way. Until recently, documentaries weren’t seen as vehicles for social change. That rapidly changed with Fahrenheit 9/11, Supersize Me, Born into Brothels and especially with An Inconvenient Truth. Suddenly, the little energy documentary I’d been working on for a decade became hot. By the end of this year when the film will be presented in theaters all over the country, the ideas and concepts in FUEL will become mainstream. That’s a powerful shift.
Q: How did your vision for the film change over the course of the pre-production, production and post-production processes?
A: I wanted to make a film about the serious challenges we face and ultimately about the power of every individual to make a difference. The biggest challenge came after we won the audience award at Sundance. It was at that time that two camps emerged - those that loved biofuels and those that thought biofuels were awful. I made the difficult choice to re-cut the movie to incorporate not just the controversy around biofuels, but also the other energy solutions that exist. Like any renovation, we started re-cutting with an eye toward repairing a few flaws and ended up knee deep in a complete re-edit. The film that emerged kept the heart of the original movie, but was different enough in content and scope that it merited a new name and a new launch. Hence FUEL was born. Everyone who has seen both films agrees that it was worth the risk, the time and the energy to make the new movie.
Q: What is next for you?
A: My team and I are taking the film on a 25-city tour across the United States this year. We will travel in a convoy of biodiesel vehicles that will go to universities, schools, town halls and political events. Our goal is to “green the vote” of America by getting everyday people, along with politicians and energy companies, to sign onto a 10-year plan that will transition America to renewable energy.
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