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Trashed (2007)

1 hour 17 minutes

http://www.trashedmovie.com/trailer.html

“Trashed” is a provocative investigation of one of the fastest growing industries in North America. The garbage business. The film examines a fundamental element of modern American culture…the disposal of what our society defines as “waste.” It is an issue influenced by every American, most of whom never consider the consequences. Nor, it seems, the implications to our biosphere. At times humorous, but deeply poignant, “Trashed” examines the American waste stream fast approaching a half billion tons annually.

What are the effects all this waste will have on already strained natural resources? Why is so much of it produced? While every American creates almost 5 pounds of it every day, who is affected most? And who wants America to make more?

The film analyzes the causes and effects of the seemingly innocuous act of “taking out the garbage” while showcasing the individuals, activists, corporate and advocacy groups working to affect change and reform the current model. “Trashed” is an informative and thought-provoking film everyone interested in the future of sustainability should see.

The Unforeseen (2007)

1 hour 33 minutes

http://theunforeseenfilm.com/blog/trailer/

Winner of the 2008 Independent Spirit Award “Truer than Fiction” Prize.

An ambitious west Texas farm boy with grandiose plans tires of living at the mercy of nature and sets out to find a life with more control. He heads to Austin where he becomes a real estate developer and skillfully capitalizes on the growth of this 1970s boomtown. At the peak of his powers, he transforms 4,000 acres of pristine Hill Country into one of the state’s largest and fastest selling subdivisions. When the development threatens a local treasure, a fragile limestone aquifer and a naturally spring-fed swimming hole, the community fights back. In the conflict that ensues, we see in miniature a struggle that today plays out in communities across the country.

Varmints (2006)

1 hour 31 minutes

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKktBno8slo

"A powerful, engaging, and surprisingly humorous expose of the strained relations between people and wildlife in the American West...leaving viewers to ponder questions about the ethics of hunting for sport and our relentless efforts to manipulate the natural world." Camas Journal

"Compelling, humorous and sad. Excellent for generating class discussion on hunting ethics, wildlife management issues, and endangered species issues. Everyone has their say, from shooters to ranchers to wildlife biologists to animal rights advocates."

International Society for Environmental Ethics

"Varmints is a wake-up call to environmentalists and sport shooters alike. Humorously told without losing sight of its ultimate goal, Varmints points out the folly of [the belief] that we can control nature without fully exploring the historical consequences of our behavior." Read full review by Ken Muir, PhD, Associate Professor of Sociology, Appalachian State University

Manufactured Landscapes (2006)

1hour 30 minutes

http://www.zeitgeistfilms.com/displaytrailer.php?directoryname=manufacturedlandscapes&size=hi gh&extension=mov

MANUFACTURED LANDSCAPES is the striking new documentary on the world and work of renowned artist Edward Burtynsky. Internationally acclaimed for his large-scale photographs of “manufactured landscapes”—quarries, recycling yards, factories, mines and dams—Burtynsky creates stunningly beautiful art from civilization’s materials and debris. The film follows him through China, as he shoots the evidence and effects of that country’s massive industrial revolution. With breathtaking sequences, such as the opening tracking shot through an almost endless factory, the filmmakers also extend the narratives of Burtynsky’s photographs, allowing us to meditate on our impact on the planet and witness both the epicenters of industrial endeavor and the dumping grounds of its waste.

In the spirit of such environmentally enlightening sleeper-hits as AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH and RIVERS AND TIDES, MANUFACTURED LANDSCAPES powerfully shifts our consciousness about the world and the way we live in it, without simplistic judgments or reductive resolutions.

Planet Earth BBC Series (2007) Each Program: 58 minutes

http://www.amazon.com/gp/mpd/permalink/mY1CNGJBCAS6I

DESERTS: This installment features the harsh environment that covers one third of the Earth: the deserts. Due to Siberian winds, Mongolia's Gobi Desert reaches extremes of temperature like no other, ranging from –40°C to +50°C. It is home to the rare Bactrian camel, which eats snow to maintain its fluid level and must limit itself to 10 litres a day if it is not to prove fatal. Africa's Sahara is the size of the USA, and just one of its severe dust storms could cover the whole of Great Britain. While some creatures, such as the dromedary, take them in their stride, for others the only escape from such bombardments is to bury themselves in the sand. Few rocks can resist them either and the outcrops shown in Egypt's White Desert are being inexorably eroded. The biggest dunes (300 metres high) are to be found in Namibia, while other deserts featured are the Atacama in Chile, the Sonoran in Arizona, and areas of the Australian outback and Utah. Animals shown surviving in such an unforgiving habitat include elephants, lions (hunting oryx), red kangaroos (which moisten their forelegs with saliva to keep cool), nocturnal fennec foxes, acrobatic flat lizards feeding on black flies, and dueling Nubian ibex. The final sequence illustrates one of nature's most fearsome spectacles: a billion-strong plague of desert locusts, destroying all vegetation in its path. Planet Earth Diaries explains how the hunt for the elusive Bactrian camels necessitated a two-month trek in Mongolia.

JUNGLES: The next installment examines jungles and tropical rainforests. These environments occupy only 3% of the land yet are home to over half of the world's species. New Guinea is inhabited by almost 40 kinds of birds of paradise, which avoid conflict with each other by living in different parts of the island.

Some of their elaborate courtship displays are shown. Within the dense forest canopy, sunlight is prized, and the death of a tree triggers a race by saplings to fill the vacant space. Figs are a widespread and popular food, and as many as 44 types of bird and monkey have been observed picking from a single tree. The sounds of the jungle throughout the day are explored, from the early morning calls of siamangs and orangutans to the nocturnal cacophony of courting tree frogs. The importance of fungi to the rainforest is illustrated by a sequence of them fruiting, including a parasite called cordyceps. The mutual benefits of the relationship between carnivorous pitcher plants and red crab spiders is also discussed. In the Congo, roaming forest elephants are shown reaching a clearing to feed on essential clay minerals within the mud. Finally, chimpanzees are one of the few jungle animals able to traverse both the forest floor and the canopy in search of food. In Uganda, members of a 150-strong community of the primates mount a raid into neighboring territory in order to gain control of it. Planet Earth Diaries looks at filming displaying birds of paradise, focusing mainly on the filming of the Six-plumed Bird of Paradise.

SHALLOW SEAS: This programme is devoted to the shallow seas that fringe the world's continents. Although they constitute 8% of the oceans, they contain most marine life. As humpback whales return to breeding grounds in the tropics, a mother and its calf are followed. While the latter takes in up to 500 litres of milk a day, its parent will starve until it travels back to the poles to feed — and it must do this while it still has sufficient energy left for the journey. The coral reefs of Indonesia are home to the biggest variety of ocean dwellers. Examples include banded sea kraits, which ally themselves with goatfish and trevally in order to hunt. In Western Australia, dolphins 'hydroplane' in the shallowest waters to catch a meal, while in Bahrain, 100,000 Socotra cormorants rely on shamals that blow sand grains into the nearby Persian Gulf, transforming it into a rich fishing ground. The appearance of algae in the spring starts a food chain that leads to an abundant harvest, and sea lions and dusky dolphins are among those taking advantage of it. In Southern Africa, as chokka squid are preyed on by short-tail stingray, the Cape fur seals that share the waters are hunted by the world's largest predatory fish: the great white shark. On Marion Island in the Indian Ocean, a group of king penguins must cross a beach occupied by fur seals that do not hesitate to attack them. Planet Earth Diaries shows the difficulties of filming the one-second strike of a great white shark.

OCEAN DEEP: The final installment concentrates on the most unexplored area of the planet: the deep ocean. It begins with a whale shark used as a shield by a shoal of bait fish to protect themselves from yellowfin tuna. Also shown is an oceanic whitetip shark trailing rainbow runners. Meanwhile, a 500-strong school of dolphins head for the Azores, where they work together to feast on scad mackerel. Down in the ocean's furthest reaches, some creatures defy classification. On the sea floor, scavengers such as the spider crab bide their time, awaiting carrion from above. The volcanic mountain chain at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean also sustains life through the bacteria that surround its sulphide vents. There are thought to be around 30,000 undersea volcanoes, some of them taller than Mount Everest. Their sheer cliffs provide anchorage for several corals and sponges. Nearer the surface, the currents that surround these seamounts force nutrients up from below and thus marine life around them is abundant. Off the Mexican coast, a large group of sailfish encircle another shoal of bait fish. The hunters change color as a message of their intentions, since an attack could also be fatal to others of their number. The last sequence depicts the largest animal on Earth: the blue whale, of which 300,000 once roamed the world's oceans. Now fewer than 3% remain. Planet Earth Diaries shows the search in the Bahamas for oceanic whitetip sharks.

Black Gold (2006)

1 hour 18 minutes

http://www.blackgoldmovie.com/

Multinational coffee companies now rule our shopping malls and supermarkets and dominate the industry worth over $80 billion, making coffee the most valuable trading commodity in the world after oil.

But while we continue to pay for our lattes and cappuccinos, the price paid to coffee farmers remains so low that many have been forced to abandon their coffee fields.

Nowhere is this paradox more evident than in Ethiopia, the birthplace of coffee. Tadesse Meskela is one man on a mission to save his 74,000 struggling coffee farmers from bankruptcy. As his farmers strive to harvest some of the highest quality coffee beans on the international market, Tadesse travels the world in an attempt to find buyers willing to pay a fair price.

Against the backdrop of Tadesse's journey to London and Seattle, the enormous power of the multinational players that dominate the world's coffee trade becomes apparent. New York commodity traders, the international coffee exchanges, and the double dealings of trade ministers at the World Trade Organisation reveal the many challenges Tadesse faces in his quest for a long term solution for his farmers.

The Future of Food (2004)

1 hour 28 minutes

http://www.thefutureoffood.com/trailer.htm

There is a revolution happening in the farm fields and on the dinner tables of America --a revolution that is transforming the very nature of the food we eat.

THE FUTURE OF FOOD offers an in-depth investigation into the disturbing truth behind the unlabeled, patented, genetically engineered foods that have quietly filled 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 lives and livelihoods have been negatively impacted by this new technology. The health implications, government policies and push towards globalization are all part of the reason why many people are alarmed by the introduction of genetically altered crops into our food supply.

Shot on location 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 seek to control 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 farm crisis today.

Drowned Out (2002)

1 hour 25 minutes

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6pj8ZT7HZ4&feature=related

Shot over three years by director Franny Armstrong (McLibel) this documentary tells the true story of one family's inspired stand against the destruction of their land homes and culture. The villagers had three choices: Move to the slums in the city; relocate to a barren resettlement site with no drinking water or stay at home and drown.The people of Jalsindhi in central India must make a decision fast. In the next few weeks their village will disappear underwater as the giant Narmada Dam fills. Best-selling author Arundhati Roy joins the fight against the dam. This film follows the Jalsindhi villagers through hunger strikes rallies police brutality and a six year Supreme Court case. It stays with them as the dam fills and the river starts to rise. This critically-acclaimed film has been viewed by over 14 million people world-wide.

How to Save the World (2007)

1 hour 44 minutes

http://www.howtosavetheworld.co.nz/

Our existence on this planet is precarious. Modern industrial agriculture is destroying the earth:� desertification, water scarcity, toxic cocktails of agricultural chemicals pervading our food chains, ocean ecosystem collapse, soil erosion and massive loss of soil fertility.

Our ecosystems ore overwhelmed. Humanity's increasing demands are exceeding the Earth's carrying capacity. A simple recipe to save the world? One old man and a bucket of cow-shit.

Are you crazy?

Why YOU should see this film

Modern agriculture causes topsoil to be eroded at 3 million tons per hour. (that’s 26 billion tons a year) Human mass is replacing biomass and other species. The carrying capacity of the earth is almost spent. To maintain our comfort zone lifestyles we will soon need five earths to sustain us in the style to which we have become accustomed. The mantra of free trade has failed the world’s poor. There is a better way. Human created climate change is destroying the Planet. Ecosystems collapse is not some sci-fi fantasy. It is real and it is happening. Right now.

Biodynamic agriculture may be the only answer we have left.

A Crude Awakening (2006)

1 hour 25 minutes

http://www.oilcrashmovie.com/

An unforgettable and shocking wake-up call A Crude Awakening offers the rock-solid argument that the era of cheap oil is in the past. Relentless and clear-eyed this intensively-researched film drills deep into the uncomfortable realities of a world that is both addicted to fossil fuels and blissfully unaware of the looming "peak oil" crisis. Drawing on an international cast of maverick energy experts and thinkers directors Basil Gelpke and Ray McCormack debunk the conventional wisdom that oil production will continue to climb and instead stare bleakly at a planet facing economic meltdown and conflict over its most valuable resource. Featuring a haunting score by Phillip Glass and a fascinating array of rare archival footage the film explores oil s rocky relationship with human progress in locales ranging from ancient Baku Azerbaijan to dusty oil-patch town McCamey, Texas. Amidst a dark and disturbing vision of our future A Crude Awakening hints at a humbler way of life built around sustainability and alternative energy providing a visually stunning boldly prophetic testament, which provokes not just thought but action.

Refugees of the Blue Planet (2006)

54 minutes

http://www.sundancechannel.com/films/500203156

In 2003, the United Nations revealed that for the first time in history, more refugees were disrupted by environmental factors than from war or political persecution. As the number of natural disasters increases and governments spend more time debating their role and responsibility as global citizens than effecting change, Canadian filmmakers Helene Choquette and Jean-Philippe Duval focus on the actual plight of individuals from the Maldives to Brazil who are being uprooted by the degradation of the environment they depend upon to live.

The Chances of the World Changing (2005)

1 hour 39 minutes

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zT87et_n_J4

The Chances of the World Changing hones in on the eccentric Richard Ogust, a former writer whose towering obsession with rescuing various species of turtle has consumed his life. Ogust spent years amassing literally hundreds of turtles -including many rare and endangered species purchased from food markets in the Asian tigers -which he housed and cared for in his New York City apartment. In time, he counted over 1,600 turtles. Intrigued by Ogust's story, Metzgar filmed him over the course of two years, a period that saw Ogust's difficulties mounting; his turtle population ballooned, and he thus found it necessary to rent a New Jersey warehouse to ultimately function as a terrarium. Meanwhile, the New Jersey Department of Fish and Wildlife began to file various charges against Ogust, for (among other accusations) poor care of the turtles. Yet Ogust continued to import the animals at the expense of his own personal well-being. Metzgar sheds light on the value of Ogust's mission, its inherent difficulties, and the preservationist's sad inability to solicit help from outside parties as turtle populations decline.

~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide