co-sponsored by WKU Greentoppers and BG Green
details at www.wku.edu/green/ecoflix

All showings are free and open to the public.
An ID card scanner will be available to students for class or activity credit.

Wednesday nights, 7:00 pm, MMTH Auditorium:

Feb. 20 - Sludge  and  A Crude Awakening: The Oil Crash
Feb. 27 - The Corporation
Mar. 19 - The Story of Stuff  and  Kilowatt Ours: A Plan for Reenergizing Our Energy Future
Mar. 26 - End of Suburbia: Oil Depletion and the Collapse of the American Dream
Apr. 9 - Koyaanisqatsi: Life Out of Balance [special outdoor showing, DUC south lawn]
Apr. 16 - Who Killed the Electric Car?
Apr. 23 - Is God Green?
Apr. 30 - Edens Lost and Found: How Ordinary Americans Are Restoring Our Great American Cities

Additional showings of these films are scheduled for each following
Thursday, 11:00 am at the theatre within The Red Zone in DUC
(buy your lunch, stay for the movie, and please feel free to come as go as needed):

Feb. 21 - Sludge  and  A Crude Awakening: The Oil Crash
Feb. 28 - The Corporation
Mar. 20 - The Story of Stuff  and  Kilowatt Ours: A Plan for Reenergizing Our Energy Future
Mar. 27 - End of Suburbia: Oil Depletion and the Collapse of the American Dream
Apr. 10 - Koyaanisqatsi: Life Out of Balance
Apr. 17 - Who Killed the Electric Car?
Apr. 24 - Is God Green?
May 1- Edens Lost and Found: How Ordinary Americans Are Restoring Our Great American Cities

Film descriptions and web links follow, in chronological order:

Sludge
Shortly after midnight on October 11, 2000, a coal sludge impoundment in Martin County, Kentucky, broke through an underground mine below, propelling 306 million gallons of sludge down two tributaries of the Tug Fork River....Sludge is a documentary that investigates a recent Kentucky coal waste disaster and examines the role of federal regulatory agencies in the coalfields. Filmed over four years, the documentary chronicles the aftermath of the spill, the “whistleblower” case of Jack Spadaro, and the looming threat of coal sludge ponds throughout the region. (30 mins)

A Crude Awakening: The Oil Crash
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. (90 mins)

The Corporation
Provoking, witty, stylish and sweepingly informative, THE CORPORATION explores the nature and spectacular rise of the dominant institution of our time. Part film and part movement, The Corporation is transforming audiences and dazzling critics with its insightful and compelling analysis. Taking its status as a legal "person" to the logical conclusion, the film puts the corporation on the psychiatrist's couch to ask "What kind of person is it?" The Corporation includes interviews with 40 corporate insiders and critics - including Noam Chomsky, Naomi Klein, Milton Friedman, Howard Zinn, Vandana Shiva and Michael Moore - plus true confessions, case studies and strategies for change. (145 mins)

The Story of Stuff
From its extraction through sale, use and disposal, all the stuff in our lives affects communities at home and abroad, yet most of this is hidden from view. The Story of Stuff is a 20-minute, fast-paced, fact-filled look at the underside of our production and consumption patterns. The Story of Stuff exposes the connections between a huge number of environmental and social issues, and calls us together to create a more sustainable and just world. It'll teach you something, it'll make you laugh, and it just may change the way you look at all the stuff in your life forever. (20 mins)

Kilowatt Ours: A Plan for Reenergizing Our Energy Future
Kilowatt Ours reveals the consequences of our coal powered economy. The film opens with Vice President Dick Cheney's energy policy speech in which Cheney makes the claim that America needs nearly 1900 new power plants in the next 20 years to meet projected electricity demands. From here, filmmaker Jeff Barrie takes viewers on a journey from the coal mines of West Virginia to the solar panel fields of Florida, as he discovers solutions to America's energy related problems. (55 mins)

End of Suburbia: Oil Depletion and the Collapse of the American Dream
Since World War II North Americans have invested much of their newfound wealth in suburbia. It has promised a sense of space, affordability, family life and upward mobility. As the population of suburban sprawl has exploded in the past 50 years, so too has the suburban way of life become embedded in the American consciousness. Suburbia, and all it promises, has become the American Dream. But as we enter the 21st century, serious questions are beginning to emerge about the sustainability of this way of life. With brutal honesty and a touch of irony, The End of Suburbia explores the American Way of Life and its prospects as the planet approaches a critical era, as global demand for fossil fuels begins to outstrip supply. What does Oil Peak mean for North America? As energy prices skyrocket in the coming years, how will the populations of suburbia react to the collapse of their dream? Are today's suburbs destined to become the slums of tomorrow? And what can be done NOW, individually and collectively, to avoid The End of Suburbia? (90 mins)

Koyaanisqatsi: Life Out of Balance
Koyaanisqatsi, which marks Godfrey Reggio's debut as a film director and producer, is the first installment of the Qatsi trilogy. The title is a Hopi Indian word meaning "life out of balance." Created between 1975 and 1982, the film is an apocalyptic vision of the collision of two different worlds -- urban life and technology versus the environment. Philip Glass composed the film's musical score.(1983). [Netflix description] (87 mins)

Who Killed the Electric Car?
Amid ever-increasing gas prices, this documentary delves into the short life of the GM EV1 electric car -- once all the rage in the mid-1990s and now fallen by the roadside. How could such an efficient, green-friendly vehicle fail to transform our garages and skies? Through interviews with government officials, former GM employees and concerned celebs (such as EV1 driver Mel Gibson), Chris Paine (former EV1 owner) seeks to answer the question. [Netflix description] (91 mins)

Is God Green?
Millions of evangelical Christians in America have taken on care of the environment as a moral and biblical obligation. But many of their brothers and sisters in the faith disagree with their stance, some because the perceived imminence of the End Times makes stewardship unnecessary. Bill Moyers and his team of investigative journalists talk with conservative evangelicals to examine the theological and political implications of their debate. (120 mins)

Edens Lost and Found: How Ordinary Americans Are Restoring Our Great American Cities
Four-part series that highlights models for urban transformation in the effort to make Chicago, Philadelphia, Los Angeles and Seattle into sustainable cities. Examines strategies that contribute to a sustainable ecosystem--including open space and public parks, urban forestry, watershed management, public art, waste disposal, recycling, green architecture, environmental justice, neighborhood development, and mass transit alternatives. (228 mins - two parts to be shown on Wed. at 7pm, and the remaining two parts on Thurs. at 11am)

Questions? email ouida.meier@wku.edu. Thanks to the people who worked to select these films: Molly Kerby, Doug Smith, Nancy Givens, Azurdee Garland, Anthony Harkins, Ted Hovet, Jeanne Sokolowski, Patrick Stewart, Sara Ferguson, Lindsay Hopper, Mary Kate Goodwin-Kelly, Mina Doerner, Tonya Taylor, and Deb Bledsoe.

Last updated: 18 February 2008.