Rural Vermont's Video Library

***INDUSTRIAL HEMP***

HEMP AND THE RULE OF LAW (DVD), 2004, 55 minutes
This documentary blends history with current events and traces hemp’s legendary past in US agriculture and chronicles the heated debate to return the crop to American farmers. In the last decade of the twentieth century, consumer demand for hemp products has resulted in the crop’s resurgence on farms throughout the western world. American farmers are not permitted to grow hemp because the US Drug Enforcement Agency makes no distinction between hemp and marijuana. A decade after the crop’s revival in other parts of the world, American farmers are still fighting for the right to grow this profitable and common sense crop.

STANDING SILENT NATION (DVD), 2007, 53 minutes
When the Oglala Sioux Tribe passed an ordinance separating industrial hemp from its illegal cousin, marijuana, Alex White Plume and his family glimpsed a brighter future.
Having researched hemp as a sustainable crop that would grow in the inhospitable soil of the South Dakota Badlands, the White Plumes envisioned a new economy that would impact the 85% unemployment rate on the Pine Ridge Reservation. They never dreamed they would find themselves swept up in a struggle over tribal sovereignty, economic rights, and common sense. From the hemp fields of Pine Ridge to the US Federal Court of Appeals, the one-hour documentary Standing Silent Nation tracks one family’s effort to create economic independence for themselves, their reservation, and their future generations.

***GLOBALIZATION & CONSOLIDATION OF FOOD SUPPLY***

DECONSTRUCTING SUPPER (VHS), 2002, 48 minutes
Renowned chef John Bishop leads viewers on an eye-opening and engaging journey into the billion-dollar battle to control global food production. Starting with a gourmet meal in his five-star restaurant, Bishop travels the world --from farmer's fields to biotech laboratories to supermarket aisles -- on a personal quest to find out what our food choices are. With a hearty appetite for food and information, chef Bishop explores the politics and ethics of food.

FAST FOOD NATION (DVD), 2006, 114 minutes
* rated R (disturbing images, strong sexuality, language and drug content)
Based on facts presented in the non-fiction book of the same name written by Eric Schlosser. The book is a scathing indictment of the fast food industry. In an usual move, director Richard Linklater has attempted to integrate these facts into a drama.

Don Henderson (Greg Kinnear)-a marketing executive at Mickey's Fast Food Restaurant chain, home of "The Big One"-has a problem. Contaminated meat is getting into the frozen patties of the company's best-selling burger. To find out why, he'll have to take a journey to the dark side of the All-American meal. Leaving the cushy confines of the company's Southern California boardroom for the immigrant-staffed slaughterhouses, teeming feedlots and cookie cutter strip malls of Middle America, what Don discovers is a "Fast Food Nation" of consumers who haven't realized it is they who are being consumed by an industry with a seemingly endless appetite for fresh meat.

THE GLOBAL BANQUET: POLITICS OF FOOD (VHS), 2001
50 mins (two 25 min segments)
Exposes globalization’s profoundly damaging effect on our food system in terms that are understandable to the non-specialist. It debunks several underlying myths about global hunger:
• That hunger results from scarcity;
• That small countries don’t know how to feed themselves; and
• That only market-driven, chemically-based, industrial agriculture can feed the world.

This film reveals how agribusiness squeezes out small farmers and how trade liberalization undercuts subsistence farming—in the U.S. as well as in the developing world. It demonstrates how food security is linked to social development and how women, in particular, are affected by that. And it links factory farming and the alteration and patenting of life forms to degradation of the natural environment.

GLOBALIZATION & NATURE: Q & A with Vandana Shiva (VHS), 2001, 29 mins
Internationally acclaimed as one of the most articulate critics of globalization, Vandana Shiva is a philosopher of science and an indefatigable activist. She articulates her brilliant perspective with passion in this Enviro Close-Up interview. Director of the Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Natural Resource Policy in New Delhi, India, Dr. Shiva’s books include: Monoculture of the Mind: Biotechnology and the Environment; Stolen Harvest: The Hijacking of the Global Food Supply; and Biopiracy and the Plunder of Nature and Knowledge.

MEATRIX TRILOGY (DVD), 2006, 15 minutes
An animated film series that exposes the truth behind today’s industrial meat and dairy production while using animation, action, and humor to educate audiences. Join heroes Moopheus, Leo, and Chickity as they confront industrial agriculture and save small, family farms.

THE POWER OF COMMUNITY: HOW CUBA SURVIVED PEAK OIL (DVD), 2006
53 minutes
When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1990, Cuba's economy went into a tailspin. With imports of oil cut by more than half – and food by 80 percent – people were desperate. This film tells of the hardships and struggles as well as the community and creativity of the Cuban people during this difficult time. Cubans share how they transitioned from a highly mechanized, industrial agricultural system to one using organic methods of farming and local, urban gardens. It is an unusual look into the Cuban culture during this economic crisis, which they call "The Special Period." The film opens with a short history of Peak Oil, a term for the time in our history when world oil production will reach its all-time peak and begin to decline forever. Cuba, the only country that has faced such a crisis – the massive reduction of fossil fuels – is an example of options and hope.

THE BOTTOM LINE: PRIVATIZING THE WORLD (VHS), 2002, 53 minutes
What has become of the concept of the "common good", which is the basis of life in society? Can the market serve as a guarantor of the common good? Through various stories shot in Canada, the USA, Mexico, France, Brazil and India, this documentary shows the consequences of the world's submission to private interests: a Canadian farmer is sued when patented seeds are blown into his fields; traditional knowledge is patented in India; American people without insurance are denied healthcare; Canadian water is sold to the highest bidder while thousands of people in the world desperately need it. Using an effective parody of the "Voice-of-God" documentary style, "Privatizing the World" presents a revealing snapshot of a global community at a crossroads. Bring your friends and family; this film is an engaging introduction to the privatization of the commons.

SUPER SIZE ME (DVD), 2004, 100 minutes
An Academy Award-nominated 2004 documentary film, directed by and starring Morgan Spurlock, an American independent filmmaker. It follows a 30-day time period (February 2003) during which Spurlock subsists exclusively on McDonald's fast food and stops exercising. The film documents this lifestyle's drastic effects on Spurlock's physical and psychological well-being and explores the fast food industry's corporate influence, including how it encourages poor nutrition for its own profit. During the filming, Spurlock dined at McDonald's restaurants three times per day, sampling every item on the chain's menu at least once. He consumed an average of 5,000 calories (the equivalent of 9.26 Big Macs) per day during the experiment.

THE TRUE COST OF FOOD (DVD), 2004, 15 minutes
This animated film highlights the hidden costs in mass-produced food and offers alternatives that are kinder to the planet and better for us. The way food is produced and the way we eat create huge costs that are not reflected in our food bills. Some are actual dollar amounts (subsidies and cleanup costs that we pay for in taxes); some are damage to the environment (pollution and loss of wildlife habitat); some are loss of quality of life (tasteless food, loss of the pleasure of preparing food and eating together); and some are health issues (obesity, diseases, poor nutrition, contaminated food).

***GMOs***

FOOD FOR THOUGHT (VHS), 29 minutes
Documentary providing an informative introduction to genetically modified organisms, their impact on our food supply, and the potential risks they pose to our health. Contains interviews with half a dozen people, including farmers and activists.

THE FUTURE OF FOOD (VHS), 2004, 88 minutes
An in-depth investigation into the disturbing truth behind the unlabeled, patented, genetically engineered foods that have quietly filled U.S. grocery store shelves for the past decade. From the prairies of Saskatchewan, Canada to the fields of Oaxaca, Mexico, this film gives a voice to farmers whose lives and livelihoods have been negatively impacted by this new technology. The health implications, government policies and push towards globalization are all part of the reason why many people are alarmed by the introduction of genetically altered crops into our food supply.

GENETIC TAKEOVER: THE MUTANT FOOD (VHS), 1999, 52 minutes
Driven by scientific curiosity and the whims of the marketplace, researchers are quickly breaking down the millennia-old barriers between species in their rush to create new food crop hybrids. In this program, Jeremy Rifkin, of the Foundation on Economic Trends; biochemist Arpad Pusztai, of the Rowett Research Institute; and other experts representing a broad spectrum of disciplines and interests voice their concerns on the issues arising from the short but alarming history of genetically modified organisms. In the final analysis, are GMOs safe to eat? Only time will tell—and by then it may be too late.

KILLING SEEDS (VHS), 2002, 45 minutes
In Canada's wheat belt, farmer Percy Schmeiser was sued by agrochem multinational Monsanto on the grounds of a patent violation, because wind and birds had carried Monsanto's genetically modified canola onto his fields. In Europe, farmer Klaus Buschmeier rounded up fellow farmers to revolt going against the German Farmers' Association. They are angry because the Association made an agreement with plant breeders to charge seed-saving fees--an act perceived as betrayal. Killing Seeds exposes the efforts of multinationals to force farmers into dependence on their "terminator technology," a process in which seeds are manipulated to germinate only once. The farmer may bring up the seed, treat crops with chemicals and sell them, but no more. Every farmer’s attempt to save his own seed or do his own breeding is either forbidden or charged with fees. In the eyes of many farmers, this monopoly has reduced them to serfdom.