March 10, 2003
Film Festival in Arntzen Hall
Collin Binder
Speakers Melissa Young and Mark Dworkin answer questions at the festival. (Photo taken by Collin Binder.)
The Hazel Wolf Environmental Film Network showed five films in Arntzen Hall 101 from February 25-27. Hazel Wolf is a non-profit organization whose movies and seminars focus on improving the quality and media coverage of environmental issues. This organization was invited to show films at Western by Assistant Professor Scott Brennan. The purposes of the films were to help bring different environmental and social situations into the public eye.
On Tuesday the 25th the organization showed the film "Running Out of Time." John de Graff is the director of this award-winning film. Graff is the founder and president of the board of the Hazel Wolf Environmental Film Festival. "This is one of the best documentary films anywhere in the United States," Brennan said. "De Graff is one of the most respected documentary film makers in the world." The film demonstrated how Americans are working more than ever with less leisure time to show for it. Americans are working on an average of 350 hours per year. This is nearly nine full weeks longer than Western Europeans, according to "Running Out of Time". The film showed how people work extra hours to acquire luxury items that are not necessary to life, such as four cars and an excess wardrobe. With more expendable income, people buy unnecessary items that create more pollution and use of resources. Many industrialized countries are consuming, wasting and polluting at a rate that is not sustainable. The more material items consumed, the more resources get depleted and the more pollution there is, according to "Running Out of Time." "If everyone in the world consumed at the rate of the United States, we would need four planets like Earth to support everyone," de Graff said. "It is time to trade productivity for leisure and realize what is really important in life.” Arntzen 101, which seats 400, was almost full of students, teachers and interested people who wanted to view this film. "I believe that this movie reflects the point of view that the United States works too hard for its own good," student John Berkley said. "We need to take notes from industrialized Germany, which has six weeks of vacation per year and has a six-hour work day. They seem to be running a successful nation." "Turtle World," an animated film, was shown on Wednesday the 26th. The film dealt with how to live sustainably by trial and error. Also shown was "Disenchanted Forest," which is about the complex societies of elders and peers of the Bornean Rainforest Orangutans. It documents their fight for survival in a homeland that is always shrinking. On Thursday the 27th there were two films shown; "Not For Sale" and "Another World is Possible." Melissa Young and Mark Dworkin directed both of these films. "Not For Sale" is a documentary that explores some little-known aspects of global trade agreements like the World Trade Organization. Patents and other intellectual property rights are expanding what corporations can own and control from mechanical machinery to knowledge and even living creatures. "Corporations are doing things in other parts of the world that some people are outraged about," Dworkin said. "United States corporations are going into other countries and finding new medical resources and patenting them. They then sell them for (a high) price to the peoples of the world with no compensation to the native peoples whom they originated from. It is not hard to see that many people think that Americans are trying to dominate the world." The other film shown on Thursday was "Another World is Possible." This film was about a rally in Porto Alegre, Brazil that had over 51,000 people from 131 nations attending. This dealt with ideas such as distributing economic power evenly to every country in the world, and compensation to countries that are exploited for their resources. Topics discussed included how to stop white people from exploiting developing countries and how to create sustainable development in these countries and the world. This event was broadcast all over the world but was virtually ignored by the U.S. press. "I think that more people should watch film(s) like these," Western student Jill Wilson said. "It helps put into perspective what we are doing to other countries and what the world opinion is about Americans." The Hazel Wolf Film Festival will have its annual showing in Leavenworth, WA March 28-31 at The Sleeping Lady. There will be over twenty different films showing and a high variety of guest speakers and discussion panels.