Available Films/ Documentaries

The Future of Food


A film directed by Deborah Koons Garcia.

The Future of Food offers an in-depth investigation into unlabeled, patented, genetically engineered foods that have stocked U.S. grocery store shelves for the past decade. From the prairies of Saskatchewan, Canada to the fields of Oaxaca, Mexico, this film gives a voice to farmers whose livelihoods have been impacted by large-scale monoculture farming and biotechnology. The health, food security, and environmental implications all contribute to why many people are alarmed by the introduction of genetically altered crops into the food supply.

Shot in the U.S., Canada and Mexico, The Future of Food examines the complex web of market and political forces that are changing what we eat as huge multinational corporations gain more control of the world's food system. The film also explores alternatives to large-scale industrial agriculture, placing organic and sustainable agriculture as real solutions to the farming issues of today. For more information about the film visit www.thefutureoffood.com


Mardi Gras: Made in China


A film directed by David Redmon and Ashley Sabin.

Mardi Gras: Made in China swiftly follows the path of Mardi Gras beads from the naked streets of New Orleans during Carnival, where revelers party 24/7, to the disciplined factories in Fuzhou, China where teenage laborers live and thread beads 24/7. Told with humor and curiosity, this film provides a global connection by introducing workers and revelers to each other through a disposable commodity: Mardi Gras beads.

The film addresses globalization from a cultural and economic perspective by humanizing the commodity chain from China to the United States. A dialogue results when bead-wearing partiers are shown images of the teenage Chinese workers and asked if they know the origin of their beads. On the other end of the world, girls who work in the bead-making factories are shown pictures of Americans exchanging beads, soliciting more beads, and decadently celebrating. The conversation reveals a glaring truth about the real benefactors of the Chinese workers' hard labor and exposes the extreme contrast between women's lives and liberty in both cultures. For more information about the film visit www.mardigrasmadeinchina.com


Thirst


A documentary directed by Alan Snitow & Deborah Kaufman

Thirst sets out to answer increasingly popular, and contentious, questions surrounding what could soon be the most important issue of our age - water. Over a billion people lack access to safe drinking water. Each year, millions of children die of diseases caused by unsafe water. The numbers are increasing.

Is water part of a shared "commons," a human right for all people? Is it a commodity to be bought, sold, and traded in a global marketplace? Thirst takes the audience on a journey into the communities of Bolivia, India, and the United States that are asking these fundamental questions. For more information about the film visit www.thirstthemovie.org (62 min)


The Ground Truth


A documentary directed by Patricia Foulkrod.

Hailed as "powerful" and "quietly unflinching," this searing documentary includes exclusive footage from the ground zero, Iraq that will stir audiences worldwide. The filmmaker's subjects are patriotic young Americans - ordinary men and women who heeded the call for military service in Iraq - as they experience recruitment and training, combat, homecoming, and the struggle to reintegrate with families and communities.

The director's statement describes the films as, " . . . not about the right or the left, or about blue or red states. It is about the hundreds of thousands of U.S. soldiers who have been released by the military after serving in Iraq - and the truth they hope to share with their fellow citizens. And most important, I wanted to share with all Americans the profound wisdom these young men and women have to impart. Their first step to healing is our listening." Find more about the film by visiting www.thegroundtruth.net (72 minutes)


America: From Freedom to Fascism


A documentary directed by Aaron Russo.

America: Freedom to Fascism is a compelling and troubling account of how the wealth of our nation was silently passed from its citizens to a handful of powerful bankers in 1913. That's the year the Federal Reserve Act and the 16th Amendment were introduced, giving a privately held corporation the means to control our finances while ensuring its interest payments through the strong arms of the newly-formed Internal Revenue Service. Ever since then, Russo suggests, Americans have been gradually conditioned to accept fewer freedoms and a lower standard of living... all the while considering debt and servitude as distinctly American values.

Russo's documentary sets out to answer one simple question: Are Americans required to pay a federal income tax? Russo starts his quest to answer this question by simply asking IRS employees to cite where it says an unapportioned income tax is required of us all. Guess what? They can't. Russo also interviews members of the tax honesty movement as well as disenfranchised IRS agents who agree that no law on the books conjures up a requirement to send the government part of one's hard-earned paycheck. Russo then showcases court cases where those accused of tax evasion have won precisely because the prosecution cannot provide evidence of a legal federal income tax law. Find more about the film by visiting www.freedomtofascism.com (107 minutes)


Affluenza


A film directed by John de Graaf, David Wann, and Thomas H. Naylor

Affluenza, was first featured on PBS in 1997 as a guided tour of America's disastrous love affair with shopping. The one-hour show was sassy, snappy, and smart. It made you laugh, even as it filled your consciousness with the horrible realization that there was ample data to support that sneaking intuition that our culture had fallen ill and could croak at any minute. The trouble? Overconsumption. We work more, to earn more, to spend more, and the spending has reached dangerously gargantuan proportions. We're shopping ourselves to death.

The good news is you can, in fact, liberate yourself. And for those who have too much, less is not just more-it's better. Restoring Nature can restore the soul. Getting out of debt may be the most revolutionary act a modern person can perform. Once you Escape from Affluenza-the title of the movie's sequel-you will recover a treasure that you didn't even realize you had lost, a very limited and precious resource, the only thing you really have in this world: your time. (Yes Magazine, article) (56 minutes)


Livable Landscapes: By Chance of By Choice?
A documentary directed by Melissa Paly

Livable Landscapes explores the connection between landscape and community in northern New England, focusing on how growth and sprawl affect quality of life. By examining the history of land use and the changes that have hit working forests, farms, village centers and urban downtowns, the video looks at how communities have tried to preserve the qualities that make them unique.

Livable Landscapes explores five communities struggling with choices about transformations that are underway: Stratham, NH; Burlington, VT; Littleton, NH; Shoreham, VT; and Scarborough, ME. (57 minutes)


Kamp Katrina


A film directed by Ashley Sabin and David Redmon

Kamp Katrina is an unflinching and authentic descent into the prevailing atmosphere of abandonment that still stubbornly grips large areas of New Orleans more than a year after the devastating hurricane Katrina struck. The movie follows New Orleans native Ms. Pearl, who spontaneously converts her backyard into a tent-village for displaced people for six months in the wake of Hurricane Katrina and the subsequent flooding of her beloved city.

The rules of Ms. Pearl's backyard, dubbed "Kamp Katrina," are simple: no drugs or alcohol, and all residents are expected to pursue employment. The situation gradually goes awry due to the overwhelming realities of personal problems merging with social problems. Kamp Katrina, is not a fact-based exploration of the Katrina crisis and its mishandling by politicians. Instead, Kamp Katrina explores the very personal daily struggles imposed by this national tragedy on a small group of troubled survivors. (74 minutes)


In Debt We Trust: America Before the Bubble Burst


A film directed by Ashley Sabin and David Redmon

In Debt We Trust: America Before the Bubble Bursts, is a provocative documentary investigating how and why financial debt grips the nation. The film is the latest from producer Danny Schechter, the recent Emmy-winning and former ABC News and CNN producer. While many credit-card abuses are examined in terms of individual or consumer scams like identity theft, this documentary takes a broader look at the ramifications behind a trend referred to as "financialization." Director Schechter describes this trend as an institutional problem involving a growing debt-and-credit complex that threatens the very fabric of our nation, not just in terms of a possible financial crash in the future but how it is impinging upon our lives and livelihoods right now.

How did we get here? Why is it that Americans and our government owe trillions in consumer debt and the national debt, a large amount of it to big banks and billions to Communist China. Why do the majority of college students graduate with over $20,000 in student loans? How do lenders profit at our expense by charging usurious rates, legally? Is this a just debt issue or a consolidation of power issue? In Debt We Trust interviews experts ranging from top government officials, realtors, ex-credit card executives, former major bank economists, and prosecutors to offer a diverse examination of such a perverse and pertinent issue.
Learn more about the film by visiting http://www.indebtwetrust.org/


Peace by Peace: Women at the Frontlines
Executive Producer, Patricia Smith Melton


Narrated by Academy Award-winning actress, Jessica Lange,Peace by Peace: Women on the Frontlines takes viewers into the lives of women who are engaged in the often ignored aspects of peace building. The documentary profiles one of the seven women drafting Afghanistan's new Constitution; female leaders of the unemployed workers promoting participatory democracy in Argentina; community builders providing micro-credit loans to women in Bosnia-Herzegovina; Hutu and Tutsi women working together to promote truth and reconciliation though a peace radio station in Burundi; and women in the United States who lost family members on 9/11, and who are now leading the search for peace in the war on terror.


Out of Balance: Exxon Mobil's Impact on Climate Change
A Joe Public Film


Out of Balance: ExxonMobil's Impact on Climate Change is a documentary exposing the influence that the largest company in the world has on governments, media, and citizens. While the Earth's climate is pushed further out of balance by increasing use of fossil fuels, ExxonMobil continues to assert undue influence around the world— making record profits while ignoring climate science for which there has been overwhelming consensus for over ten years.Out of Balance does not just critique ExxonMobil, it also offers challenging, large-scale ideas for the global social changes that must take place if there's any chance of having a livable planet for future generations.