Film Festival to Showcase Environmental Shorts From Across the Nation

The Wild and Scenic Environmental Film Festival, presented in joint effort by Patagonia, Blue Ridge Mountain Sports, and Appalachian Voices, will be held November 11, 2008 at the Lyric Theatre in Blacksburg, Virgina. The event is a benefit for Appalachian Voices.

Screenings will begin at 7 p.m and will include ten short films made for and by activists. Drawings for door prizes including pottery, scenic photography, Patagonia fleeces, and more will be held following the screenings.

Tickets to the festival are $8 per person and can be purchased at Blue Ridge Mountain Sports, online at www.appalachianvoices.org, or at the door. Appalachian Voices members are eligible for free admission if they bring a friend. For $15, festival attendees can purchase both admission and an Appalachian Voices membership. After the films, members are invited to attend an exclusive after-party event.

For more information, including a complete list of prizes and film descriptions, visit www.appalachianvoices.org.

The Good Fight – Mark Fraser
Martin Litton at 90 is still hard to follow; he flies his plane, navigates mighty rivers, attends film festivals and advises Senators in Washington D.C. on how to manage our forests. The Good Fight chronicles an extraordinary man’s efforts in saving the Grand Canyon from being ruined with dams and his ongoing struggle to preserve the Giant Sequoias from the axe of the Forest Service. (USA, 2006, 20 min)

Water Loving Doggies – Will Kier
There are places in this world and moments in time when paradise does exist. Join some furry friends down on the Yuba. (USA, 2007, 2:40 min)
Global Focus

Will Parrinello, Tom Dusenbery, John Antonelli
Grassroots environmental heroes too often go unrecognized. Thus, in 1990 San Francisco civic leaders and philanthropists Richard and Rhoda Goldman created the Goldman Environmental Prize, which recognizes individuals for sustained and significant efforts to protect and enhance the natural environment, often at great personal risk. Winner of the SIDA Environmental Conservation Award. (All Over the World, 2007, 27 min)

Organism – Ken Glaser
A few years ago, filmmaker/songwriter Ken Glaser witnessed nature putting on an unusual show for the residents of Diamond Bar, CA. For several balmy August days, thousands of birds descended from cruising altitude at dusk and gathered near the Kmart. Floating on air currents like swimmers carried by waves, they played in the wind for an hour, at times acting like a single, pulsating organism, before finally settling on a large tree. Ken captured two nights on film, and wrote the original score that complements the hypnotic activity of the flock. (USA, 2005, 8min)

Climate: A Crisis Averted
Free Range Studios
This film looks back from the year 2056, and recounts how ordinary citizens in 2006 — realizing that global warming was a scientific fact and not a climatic theory — take action to demand clean energy and other planet-friendly options. The piece describes how a movement called RenewUS effected real change with an action plan, a ‘call-to-arms’ about global warming. (USA, 2 min.)

A Forest Returns
Jean Andrews and Steve Fetsch
Film producer Jean Andrews traces the rebirth of a forest in southeastern Ohio after generations of clear-cutting and farming. The project came about through Andrew’s friendship with 93-year-old Ora E. Anderson and illustrates our evolving relationship with the land through Anderson’s movingly personal account, archival photographs, 1930s newspaper reports, and features music composed and performed by southeastern Ohio musician Bruce Dalzell. (USA, 30min)

Black Mesa Trust – Michael Schoenfeld
For 30 years, Peabody Coal Company has been withdrawing water from Arizona’s aquifers for a coal slurry line to California. Ancient springs and wells are beginning to run dry, leading to devastating effects on the environment, cultures, and well-being of the Hopi and Diné (Navajo) living on Black Mesa. (USA, 2007, 4:18min)

Carpa Diem – Sergio Cannella
Before sleeping, a child in her apartment is lovingly watching a fish in the aquarium. In the meantime her younger brother is being mindless of the open tap the water flowing out of the washbasin… a waste that could turn into a tragedy. Recipient of many awards, including: Best Short, Vatavaran FF; Best Spot, Festival International Du Film Sur L’Énergie de Lausanne. (Italy, 2006, 2min)

I Love Mountains – Mary Anne Hitt
450 mountains blown up … 1,000 streams buried … 1 million acres flattened. Just southwest of our nation’s capital, one of the greatest human rights and environmental tragedies in American history is taking place right now. In this short film, the organization Appalachian Voices illustrates how mountaintop mining is erasing some of the most beautiful and oldest landscapes in the United States. (USA, 2006, 8min)