Film Categories: Ecology

  • Cape Breton Endangered Spaces, The

    This film documents the large scale clear-cutting on public lands on Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia and areas that are still uncut that are in urgent need of wilderness preservation.

  • Final (Toxic 6)

    “Final” is a nihilistic glimpse of a future where our time has finally run out. Civilization is in ruins as storms explode over half-demolished buildings. The clock accelerates in anticipation of our encroaching successor.

  • Term, The

    A lovely and spare animated film illustrating the poem, “The Term,” by William Carlos Williams. The film is an homage to the work of Williams and to the school of Imagist Poetry, which he founded and best exemplifies. The filmmaker chose this particular poem because of the power of the imagery, the constant metamorphosis, the musicality of the words and the gentle humanistic quality of the message. All these things lend themselves well to film: particularly to the style of animation she has developed. The animation is hand-drawn pencil on paper, fully animated twelve drawings per second. The drawings illustrate…

  • Resurrectus Est.

    “Resurrectus Est.” is a hand-painted film which suggests, from the first, a spread of fragments of plants and flowers, individual petals and bits of twig with multiple colors, with much green “leafiness.” This gives way to solid yellows and browns of, or suggesting, dried grass and earth (the decay, as it were, of the above mentioned fragments); but then again, and so spaced with clear light whites as to appear airy, wind-blown, somesuch, miniscule fragments of plant life, gradually enlarging to fill-the-frame. Amidst the many floral and earthen tones, there is a particular ethereal pale, almost phosphorescent, blue which so…

  • Come Alive

    A mock commercial which documents the growing problem of pollution on the beaches and deserts of Baja, Mexico. We truly are a “Pepsi generation.”

  • Animal Nightmares

    “Animal Nightmares” is a conceptual music film which explores the spiritual connection between man and nature. The conflict between man and animal states, extinction and existence, conjures the sad truth that our survival in the modern world is not a given. Featuring music and animation by Paul Watson.

  • Fat of the Land

    In the first kitchen-grease-powered road movie, five women tour America fueling up on the waste oil their fellow travelers have left behind. From New York to San Francisco, the women careen across the nation in their modified van, fueled only by leftover restaurant frying oil. Through interviews and chance encounters, the video sardonically critiques the stranglehold petroleum has on our economy, while investigating the possibility of bio-diesel as an alternative. Shot in an energetic style, consistent with the do-it-yourself impetus of the project, this documentary humourously engages ordinary people in a serious discussion about transportation fuel. Selected screenings: MACBA, Barcelona,…

  • Street Sweeper Suite

    A night in the life of a street-sweeping machine as it roams from one street to the next in its endless search for litter. With an original score by Legion of Green Men.

  • Leche

    This film, hand processed and hung to dry on the clothesline, examines details of the life of one family, living on an isolated dairy ranch in Central Mexico. Uman’s “Mala Leche” (2003) is a companion piece. Spanish language with sub-titles.

  • In the Garden

    A quiet moment with the plants. A home-grown film: shot in my garden, processed in my basement, and dried on the lawn. (LF) Selected screenings: Anthology Film Archives, New York, 2007; Images Festival, Toronto, ON, 2004; Pleasure Dome New Toronto Works, Toronto, ON, 2004; “Textured Traces,” Foreman Art Gallery, Montreal, QC, 2005; Best of the LIFT $99 Film Festival Tour, various locations, 2005