Wednesday, January 23
Sustainable Princeton Leadership Awards
Wednesday Jan. 23, 7:00 p.m.
Individuals and organizations are recognized for their initiatives supporting the community’s sustainability in areas such as green building, healthy eating, buying local, changing consumer habits and more.
Thursday, January 24
Opening Night Film: You’ve Been Trumped
Directed by Anthony Baxter
Thursday Jan. 24, 7:00 p.m.
Running time: 93 minutes
When celebrity billionaire Donald Trump bought up one of Scotland’s last areas of coastal wilderness to build an expansive golf resort, he encountered a group of locals who fought the project. This documentary by British filmmaker Anthony Baxter focuses on how the residents, without the support of local officials, stood up to bullying from the Trump organization and refused to be forced out of their homes.
A Q&A follows the screening with producer Richard Phinney.
Friday, January 25
An Original DUCKumentary
Friday Jan. 25, 4:00 p.m.
Produced by Ann Johnson Prum
Running time: 60 min.
Ducks are familiar animals, but most of us don’t really know these phenomenal, sophisticated creatures at all. Narrated by Emmy Award-winning actor Paul Giamatti, this film follows a wood duck family as a male and female create a bond, migrate together across thousands of miles, nurture and protect a brood of chicks, then come full circle as they head to their wintering grounds. In the process, the unique abilities and extraordinary behaviors that are hallmarks of ducks’ evolutionary success are explored. Part of the Nature series, a production of THIRTEEN for WNET.
A talk follows the screening by former New Jersey State Ornithologist Charles Leck.
Detropia
Directed and produced by Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady
Friday Jan. 25, 7:00 p.m.
Running time: 90 min.
Told through the eyes of people struggling to stay in the city of Detroit despite its decline, this documentary features artistic and haunting images of a once grand city on the brink of dissolution. Refusing to abandon hope or resistance, the residents reflect the spirit of the Motor City, its battle to survive in postindustrial America and its trudge toward a radically different future. Along the way, the film reveals a correlation with the rest of middle-class America and the widening chasm of income inequality.
A discussion follows the screening led by Marty Johnson, founder and CEO of Trenton’s Isles, Inc.
Saturday, January 26
Wallaby Tales Traveling Zoo Show
Saturday Jan. 26, 11:00 a.m.
Wildlife educator Travis Gale uses humor and live animals from all over the world in a presentation for the whole family. Entertaining, high-energy and educational, the program highlights the importance of protecting the wildlife.
Cape Spin: An American Power Struggle
Directed by John Kirby and Robbie Gemmel
Saturday Jan. 26, 1:00 p.m.
Running time 84 min.
When energy entrepreneur Jim Gordon first proposed putting 130 wind turbines in fabled Nantucket Sound, he had no idea that a firestorm would erupt. This film tells the incredible tale of how America’s first proposed offshore wind farm triggered a schism in this idyllic coastal region, pitting neighbor against neighbor and environmentalist against environmentalist. Revealing the root causes of their furor, the filmmakers enjoyed unprecedented behind-the-scenes access to the key players on both sides of the controversy. The tale frames the battle over Nantucket Sound as a microcosm of America’s struggle toward energy sustainability. After 10 years, $70 million and 8,000 pages of analysis, the Federal Government approved the wind farm project in 2010.
A Q&A follows the screening led by filmmakers John Kirby andLibby Handros with Philip Warburg, author of “Harvest the Wind.”
Copies of “Harvest the Wind” will be available for purchase and signing.
Passive Passion
Directed by Charlie Hoxie
Saturday Jan. 26, 4:00 p.m.
Running time: 21 min.
This documentary details the Passive House design method, an approach that combines heavy insulation, airtightness, and heat-recovery ventilation to achieve reductions of up to 90 percent in the energy required for heating and cooling. Considering that buildings contribute as much as 40 percent of our country’s carbon emissions, and half of that is for heating and cooling, savings of this magnitude could have considerable implications for our warming planet. This film also examines the extent to which European builders have taken the concept, and the vast ground American Passive House enthusiasts have to make up.
A Q&A follows the screening with filmmaker Charlie Hoxie and Pennington, NJ architect Doug Schotland, who specializes in Passive House design.
Beasts of the Southern Wild
Directed by Benh Zeitlin
Saturday Jan. 26, 7:00 p.m.
Running time: 93 min.
In a forgotten but defiant bayou community cut off from the rest of the world by a sprawling levee, a 6-year-old girl exists on the brink of orphan hood. Buoyed by her childish optimism and extraordinary imagination, she believes that the natural world is in balance with the universe until a fierce storm changes her reality. Desperate to repair the structure of her world in order to save her ailing father and sinking home, this tiny hero must learn to survive unstoppable catastrophes of epic proportions. The feature film stars Quvenzhane Wallis, Dwight Henry and Levy Easterly.
A Q&A follows the screening with associate producer Casey Coleman.
The Rhythm of Rutledge
Directed and produced by The Last Volunteer
Sunday Jan. 27, 11:00 a.m.
Running time: 27 min.
Rutledge, Mo., is a town of 100 residents, one general store, zero stoplights and thousands of acres of corn and soy. This rural landscape is also home to three ‘intentional communities’ that seek healthier ways of treating the land and one another. An experiment in observational cinema, “The Rhythm of Rutledge” immerses the audience into the environments of these communities, allowing minimal dialog to echo through long sections of observation, weaving ideology with the beauty of hands-on work with the land.
A Q&A follows the screening with The Last Volunteer team of filmmakers and Alyson Ewald, a co-founder of Red Earth Farms, a homesteading community in Missouri.
Sunday January 27
I’m Carolyn Parker: The Good, the Mad and the Beautiful”
Directed by Jonathan Demme
Sunday Jan. 27, 1:00 p.m.
Running time: 91 min.
Carolyn Parker was the last to leave her neighborhood as Hurricane Katrina approached New Orleans in the summer of 2005. She was also the first to return to her flood-devastated community with what many thought was the impossible dream of bringing her ruined home back to life. This documentary takes viewers deep inside Parker’s personal biography as a child born in the ‘40s, teenager on the front lines in the Civil Rights movement, cook-turned-chef in the hotel industry and one of the most outspoken voices in the fight for every resident’s right to return home after Katrina. An inspiring portrait of an extraordinary woman, the film follows Parker as she faces her challenges with unbridled wit, spirituality and an abiding sense of social justice.
Presented in partnership with American Documentary/POV.
A Q&A will follow the screening with film producer Daniel Wolff, author of “The Fight for Home: How Parts of New Orleans Came Back,” with Parker’s daughter, Kyrah Julian, who is featured in the film.
Copies of “The Fight for Home” will be available for purchase and signing.
Panel Discussion: Hurricane Sandy, Climate Change and the Future of Our Coastline
Sunday Jan. 27, 4:00 p.m.
A panel discussion with filmmaker Ben Kalina, film editor Marc D’Agostino, journalist Michael Lemonick and Tom Dallessio, outreach director at the Center for Resilient Design Director, at the New Jersey Institute of Technology. They will explore how climate change may factor into development of coastal communities. Kalina’s film and video projects focus on the intersection of science, culture and the environment. He has worked on the documentaries “Two Square Miles” and “A Sea Change,” and is the director/producer of grand-prize winning fiction shorts and documentaries. Kalina’s work in progress, “Shored Up” is about beach erosion, including the damage caused by Hurricane Sandy. Lemonick is the senior staff writer at Climate Central and a former senior science writer at Time magazine. He has also written for Discover magazine, Yale Environment 360, Scientific American, and others. He is the author of “The Georgian Star,” “Echo of the Big Bang” and “Other Worlds: The Search For Life in the Universe.”
Wednesday January 30
Shellshocked: Saving Oysters to Save Ourselves
Directed and produced by Emily Driscoll
Wednesday, Jan. 30, 6:00 p.m.
Running time: 40 min.
This film follows efforts to prevent the extinction of wild oyster reefs, which keep oceans healthy by filtering water and engineering ecosystems. Today, because of overfishing and pollution, wild oyster reefs have been declared the most severely impacted marine habitat on Earth and no longer play a role in their ecosystems. Now scientists, government officials, artists and environmentalists are fighting to bring oysters back to the former oyster capital of the world: New York Harbor.
A Q&A follows the screening with filmmaker Emily Driscoll, Meredith Comi, director of NY/NJ Baykeeper’s oyster restoration program; and Mara Haseltine, an environmental artist who creates non-toxic living oyster sculptures that are habitats for future aquatic life. Terra Momo will will host a dinner (tickets available for purchase online) with the filmmaker at Medittera Restaurant following the screening and Q&A.
Thursday January 31
Presentation: “The B Home: A Beehive-Shaped Disaster Relief Shelter
Thursday, Jan. 31, 4:00 p.m.
The B Home is a conceptual modular shelter system developed by Peter Abrams of Modern Metal Work in partnership with the Princeton University organization Engineering Projects in Community Service. This event is an overview of the work of EPICS students, who for three years have been conceptualizing and a hexagonal-shaped housing unit for use by people displaced after natural disasters. Designed for one person, the units are 7-feet tall, 8-feet wide and 10-feet long, have dome-like ceilings, a bed that folds into a couch and a large window that allows in natural light. The units can be stacked in the shape of a beehive.
Artist Peter Abrams, who specializes in creating art out of recycled materials and whose idea inspired the B Home, will speak.
Soul Food Junkies
Directed by Byron Hurt
Thursday Jan. 31, 7:00 p.m.
Running time: 64 min.
Soul food is a quintessential American cuisine, with a rich history and an abiding significance to black cultural identity. But with its core celebration of all things fried and smothered, it has also had lasting effects on African Americans’ health, both for better and for worse.
Filmmaker Byron Hurt looks at the past and future of soul food, from its roots in Western Africa, to its incarnation in the American South, to its contribution to modern health crises in communities of color. The film also looks at the socioeconomics of the modern American diet, and how the food industry profits from making calories cheap, but healthy options expensive and hard to find.
A dinner provided by the Terra Momo Restaurant Group and The Suppers Program will be served in the Terra Libri Caf in the library prior to the film.
A Q&A follows the screening with filmmaker Byron Hurt, with Raoul Momo, owner of Terra Momo Restaurant Group, and Dorothy Mullen, founder of The Suppers Program.
Waking the Green Tiger
Written and directed by Gary Marcuse
Friday, Feb. 1, 4:00 p.m.
Running time: 78 min.
Seen through the eyes of activists, farmers and journalists, the documentary follows an extraordinary campaign to stop a huge dam project on the Upper Yangtze River in southwestern China. Featuring astonishing archival footage never seen outside China, and interviews with a government insider and witnesses, the documentary also tells the history of Chairman Mao’s campaigns to conquer nature in the name of progress.
A Q&A follows the screening with filmmaker Gary Marcuse via videoconference.
Chasing Ice
Directed and produced by Jeff Orlowski
Friday Feb. 1, 7:00 p.m.
Running time: 76 min.
The film follows environmental photographer James Balog as he and a band of young adventurers begin deploying revolutionary time-lapse cameras across the brutal Arctic to capture a multi-year record of the world’s changing glaciers. As the debate polarizes America and the intensity of natural disasters ramps up globally, Balog’s hauntingly beautiful videos compress years into seconds and capture ancient mountains of ice in motion as they disappear at a breathtaking rate. “Chasing Ice” depicts a photographer trying to deliver evidence and hope to our carbon-powered planet.
A discussion led by Olga Sergienko, Glaciologist, Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Screens again on Saturday Feb. 2, 7:00 p.m.
The Animal House
Written and edited by Mark Fletcher
Saturday, Feb. 2, 11:00 a.m.
Running time: 60 min.
Skyscrapers towering over major cities or elaborate bridges often come to mind when we think of great feats in architecture and engineering. However, some of the most amazing, creative, and innovative structures on earth are not man-made, but built by animals in the natural world. Guided by instinct, animal architects gain shelter and protection from a remarkable variety of elaborate dwellings they build with simple supplies. Part of the Nature series, a production of THIRTEEN for WNET.
My Life as a Turkey
Produced by David Allen
Saturday Feb. 2, 1:00 p.m.
Running time: 60 min.
After a local farmer left a bowl of eggs on Joe Hutto’s front porch, his life was forever changed. Hutto, possessing a broad background in the natural sciences and an interest in imprinting young animals, incubated the eggs and waited for them to hatch. As the chicks emerged from their shells, they locked eyes with an unusual but dedicated mother. This film traces Hutto’s remarkable experiences during the year he raised the hatchlings to adulthood. Part of the Nature series, a production of THIRTEEN for WNET.
SATURDAY AFTERNOON SHORT FILMS
Scars of Freedom
Directed by Cline Cousteau
Saturday Feb. 2, 2:30 p.m.
Running time: 6 min.
Imperiled by human negligence when she becomes entangled in a fishing net, a humpback whale is saved by human compassion when an underwater film crew comes to her rescue.
Sanctuary: The Last Stand for Sharks
Saturday Feb. 2, 2:45 p.m.
Directed and produced by John Weller and Shawn Heinrichs
Running time: 29 min.
This film portrays the underwater world of sharks and the global threats they face. It highlights the steps needed to protect sharks in the Federated States of Micronesia and the growing movement to save them from extinction.
Carbon for Water
Directed by Evan Abramson and Carmen Elsa Lopez
Saturday Feb. 2, 4:00 p.m.
Running time: 22 min.
In Kenya’s Western Province, scarce safe drinking water and expensive wood fuel used for purification make waterborne illness a daily, life-threatening reality among the impoverished population. This film introduces a solution to this worsening problem. An innovative company has financed the distribution and maintenance of 900,000 water filters in Western Province, funded entirely by carbon credits. These credits are awarded for actual reductions in use of wood fuel as well as the anticipated reduction in future fuel use. The filters help to slow deforestation, as household demand for wood drops. In this way, and in just five weeks, 4.5 million people were given the means to purify their water, which in turn unlocks the potential to improve families’ income, education, and health.
Chasing Ice
Directed and produced by Jeff Orlowski
Saturday Feb. 2, 7:00 p.m.
Running time: 76 min.
The film follows environmental photographer James Balog as he and a band of young adventurers begin deploying revolutionary time-lapse cameras across the brutal Arctic to capture a multi-year record of the world’s changing glaciers. As the debate polarizes America and the intensity of natural disasters ramps up globally, Balog’s hauntingly beautiful videos compress years into seconds and capture ancient mountains of ice in motion as they disappear at a breathtaking rate. “Chasing Ice” depicts a photographer trying to deliver evidence and hope to our carbon-powered planet.
A discussion led by Olga Sergienko, Glaciologist, Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Sunday February 3
Nagaland: The Last of the Headhunters
Directed by Patrick Morell
Sunday Feb. 3, 11:00 a.m.
Running time: 70 min.
An exploration of the Nagaland Region, which extends from Northeast India into Northern Myanmar, this film both documents the ancient rituals that preserve the proud traditions of the 16 Naga tribes still living in these remote forests and examines how Naga society has adapted to survive in contemporary times. Interviews with community leaders and scenes of daily life balance these rituals, illuminating how the Naga accommodate those traditions and the intrusions of the modern world. “Nagaland” reveals a culture that remains rich and complex even as its basic underpinnings have fewer and fewer outlets for expression in the present.
A Q&A follows the screening with director Patrick Morell.
Felt, Feelings And Dreams
Produced and directed by Andrea Odezynska
Sunday Feb. 3, 1:00 p.m.
Running time: 30 minutes
Princeton filmmaker Andrea Odezynska follows a small group of women in the former Soviet Republic of Kyrgyzstan who are pulling themselves out of poverty by reviving ancient traditions of making crafts and art from felt. A celebration of perseverance and spirit set against the region’s stunningly beautiful and harsh landscape, the film explores the women’s feelings about their work, the friendships they form, the daughters they get to know better and the children they can now feed.
A Q&A follows the screening with filmmaker Andrea Odezynska and animator Polina Zaitsev.
SUNDAY AFTERNOON SHORT FILMS
Irish Folk Furniture
Directed by Tony Donoghue
Sunday Feb. 3, 2:30 p.m.
Running time: 9 min.
This short documentary uses live action and animation to tell a tale about the cultural and social history of handmade Irish farmhouse furniture. Realizing that “there was almost nowhere in the world that families knew the whole history of their furniture,” the director spent a decade researching the topic and interviewing residents in rural Tipperary where he grew up.
Living Tiny
Directed by Paul Meyers and Paul Donatelli
Sunday Feb. 3, 2:45 p.m.
Running time: 7 min.
A new vision of home is explored in this look at three generations of Californians who seek an alternative to traditional construction.
The Queen of Versailles
Directed by Lauren Greenfield
Sunday Feb. 3, 3:00 p.m.
Running time: 100 min.
The innate virtues and flaws of the American dream are revealed in this character-driven documentary about a billionaire family confronting financial challenges in the wake of the economic crisis. The film begins with the family triumphantly constructing the largest privately owned house in America, a 90,000-square-foot palace. Over the next two years, their sprawling empire, fueled by the real estate bubble and cheap money, falters, and major changes in lifestyle and character ensue within the cross-cultural household of family members and domestic staff.
A post-screening will be led by Linda Mead, executive director of the D&R Greenway.
Thursday, February 7
To Make a Farm
Produced and directed by Steven Suderman
Thursday Feb. 7, 4:00 p.m.
Running time: 74 min.
Five young people without farming backgrounds strive to make their farming dreams a reality. Starting from scratch, they meet the risks and challenges of a demanding profession with imagination, passion and sacrifice. The film offers a hopeful look at small-scale food production in an age of industrialized agriculture.
Judith Robinson, manager of Princeton Farmers’ Market will lead a post-screening Q&A featuring local farmers sharing experiences about starting farms.
Symphony of the Soil
Produced and directed by Deborah Koons Garcia
Thursday Feb. 7, 7:00 p.m.
Running time: 103 min.
This documentary explores the complexity and mystery of soil. Filmed on four continents and sharing the voices of some of the world’s most esteemed soil scientists, farmers and activists, the film portrays soil as a protagonist of our planetary story. Using a mix of art and science, the film shows that soil is a complex living organism, the foundation of life on earth. The film also examines the use and misuse of soil in agriculture, deforestation and development, and the latest scientific research on its key role in improving the most challenging environmental problems of our time.
A discussion follows the film with Judith Robinson and Joseph Heckman, Professor Soil Science at Rutgers University, and Chris Smith, Soil Conservation Service – Soil Environmentalist.
Friday, February 8
Sustainable Princeton Great Ideas Breakfast
Friday Feb. 8, 8:30 a.m.
Please join us bright and early for this event where Sustainable Princeton will introduce its energy and waste reduction goals for the town. Attendees can hear “lightning talks” from local sustainability advocates, participate in group discussions and have a light breakfast including Fair Trade food and beverages.
A Watershed Moment
Friday Feb. 8, 10:00 a.m.
Running time: 28 min.
The film looks at threats to New Jersey’s water resources and the people working to save them. Created by Princeton Community Television about the Stony Brook-Millstone Watershed.
In the Same Boat
Directed by Rachel Bower
Friday Feb. 8, 1:00 p.m.
Running time: 35 min.
Set in the rugged landscape of coastal Newfoundland and the expansive ranchlands of Southern Alberta, this film is an intimate portrait of one of Newfoundland’s last remaining inshore cod fishermen and an independent family famer in Alberta as they struggle to save their traditional lifestyles.
Creating a Climate for Change
Directed by Jeffrey Barbee
Friday Feb. 8, 2:30 p.m.
Running time: 32 min.
Africa, a continent facing frequent droughts, is especially vulnerable to climate change. But Africans are finding innovative solutions. This film takes viewers on a journey through Southern Africa exploring local people-driven projects that help communities adapt to climate change and restore ecological systems.
Hardwater
Produced and directed by Ryan Brod and Daniel Sites
Friday Feb. 8, 4:00 p.m.
Running time: 75 min.
This film follows a 77-year-old Maine ice fisherman and the sport he loves. Through his stories and reflections, a picture of Maine’s ice-fishing history emerges and the challenges to our ecosystem brought about by environmental shifts and illegally introduced invasive fish species are revealed.
Saturday, February 9
Battle for Brooklyn
Directed by Michael Galinsky and Suki Hawley
Saturday Feb. 9, 2:30 p.m.
Running time: 93 min.
Shot over the course of eight years, this film follows the story of reluctant activist Daniel Goldstein’s fight to prevent the demolition of his Brooklyn home and community to make way for the massive Atlantic Yards development project. The effort to stop the project pitted Goldstein and his neighbors against developer Forest City Ratner, an entourage of lawyers, the government, public relations emissaries and residents who supported the plan. Waging battle in the courts, the streets and the media, Goldstein and his group Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn exposed what they said were misconceptions about the project and corruption at the heart of the plan.
A Q&A follows the screening with filmmaker Michael Galinsky via video conference.
Sourlands
Directed by Jared Flesher
Saturday Feb. 9, 7:00 p.m.
Running time: 78 minutes
This films offers a look at the effects of climate change and human-created imbalances on the central New Jersey forest known as the “Sourlands” through the eyes of the residents who care for it deeply. The film premiered here last summer and is returning by popular demand.
A Q&A follows the film with director Jared Flesher, native plant expert Jared Rosenbaum and Wattvision CEO Survag Singh.
Sunday, February 10
Presentation: Saving Veblen House
Sunday Feb. 10, 11:00 a.m.
Through video and photos, local naturalist Stephen Hiltner will present a portrait of Oswald and Elizabeth Veblen and the plight of the Princeton homestead they left in the public trust in 1974. A visionary and mathematician, Oswald Veblen was instrumental in organizing the Institute for Advanced Study and bringing Albert Einstein and many other famed scholars to Princeton. Efforts to preserve the Veblen House will be discussed.
Into Spring
Directed by Udo Prinsen in collaboration with Han Bennink
Sunday Feb. 10, 1 p.m.
Running time: 4 min.
The drumming rhythms of two woodpeckers are set to motion in this short film from the Netherlands. “Into Spring” captures the season, blending clever animation with music by jazz percussionist and visual artist Han Bennink. Woodpeckers, hares and other characters from drawings by Bennink create a unique and cheerful universe.
Birders: The Central Park Effect
Directed by Jeffrey Kimball
Sunday Feb. 10, 1:15 p.m.
Running time: 60 min.
This film reveals the extraordinary array of wild birds that grace Manhattan’s Central Park and the equally colorful New Yorkers who schedule their lives around the rhythms of migration. Featuring spectacular wildlife footage capturing the changing seasons, this documentary reveals a world that goes all but unnoticed by the 38 million people who visit America’s most famous park each year.
A Q&A will follow the screening with filmmaker Director Jeffrey Kimball.
The Island President
Directed by Jon Shenk
Sunday Feb. 10, 4:00 p.m.
Running time: 101 min.
After a long fight to bring democracy to his homeland, Mohamed Nasheed became president of the Maldives at age 41. Knowing that a rise of a mere three meters in sea level would render the country practically unlivable, Nasheed took up the fight to save it from disappearing under the sea. The film follows Nasheed’s first year in office that culminated in a trip to the Copenhagen Climate Summit in 2009, where he emerged as one of the leading international voices for urgent action on climate change.
A discussion follows the film led by John Krasting, Physical Scientist, Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory, Climate and Ecosystems Group.