Windfall
Mar 02 - Mar 08, 2012
(Laura Israel, 2010, USA, 35mm, 81 min)
Seattle premiere!
The realities of modern rural life, energy production and the environmental movement clash in unexpected ways. This new documentary chronicles the upheaval visited on Meredith, New York, when an industrial wind farm takes up residence. Filmmaker Laura Israel, a part-time Meredith resident, interviewed locals on both sides of the divided community: those who have turned their land over to the 400-foot-high turbines to offset falling agricultural profits, and those for whom the noise and aesthetic blight outweigh any positive impact on the local economy. Turns out it’s not easy being green.
"It’s about the American tendency — and very likely the human tendency — to look for magic-bullet solutions to complicated social and economic problems, where none are available. It’s a microcosmic version of the political divisions — between left and right, environmentalists and free-marketers, corporations and citizens — that have virtually paralyzed our republic. It’s a reminder that whenever a virtually unregulated industry (as in this case) offers capitalists a chance to defraud the little guy and make a bundle, they’ll do it. It’s a tantalizing case study that suggests ordinary people still have the power to steer a course between faceless bureaucracies and greedy capitalists, but only just — and only if they can find a way to overcome their differences and work together." —Salon.com
