Guillot_Annotation+6

Rachel Guillot Film Annotation 6  The Forest for the Trees The film “The Forest for the Trees” was directed by Bernadine Mellis and released in the last five years. The film followed the life of Judi Bari, an environmental activist who lived between 1949 and 1997. She was extremely involved in deforestation issues and was injured by a pipe bomb and later labeled as a violent terrorist by the FBI. It follows her fight to redeem her name and the fight of Dennis Cunningham after she died of cancer.

The matrix of sustainability problems in this film begin with deforestation, the main reason Judi was an environmental activist. It was stated that trees were the focal point but the issues were about the earth, water, and air as well. Deforestation exhausts the natural resources creates more air pollution, and hurts the soil through erosion and a lack of nutrients. This film also addressed the different types of environmental organizations, the peaceful means of stopping the destruction [blockades] and the violent means [tree spikes, equipment destruction], the prejudice against environmental activist groups, such as death threats received by Judi during the Redwood Summer which was a planned civil disobedience event. The film goes on to describe the lack of civil rights given to sustainability fighters and if something happens, the organization is discredited. A few more problems are that the corporations are protected by the government more than citizens and activists, there is a disconnect between environmentalists, workers, and companies but in many cases agreements can still be made, the regulatory systems need honest policing and organization like the FBI cannot always be trusted. The legal system and court proceedings in the United States need to be rethought, judges have the right to exclude evidence and the forum allows choice in where the court trial occurs. The legal process is also extremely slow. There is also a tendency for dissent to be categorized as terrorism, and civic actors generally burn themselves out as opposed to being sustainable sources of involvement.

The compelling aspects of the film were the contrast of people who were shown and interviewed, both the environmentalists and attorneys, it was also very compelling to see the environmentalists in their meetings and the footage of them arguing certain points for the courts. The connection between the environmentalists and workers and owners and the depiction of the difference between the different logging groups [such as Louisiana versus San Francisco] and environmentalists was especially interesting to note. The informality of the film worked well for the point it was making and because the film was so closely related to people and their relationships. It showed a real situation and gave life to the characters. Emotion conveying was also accomplished successfully through the personal interviews and narration. The shortness of the film helped in its effectiveness and was one of the key reasons it could become a good educational tool. The one hour nature of the film allows it to be viewed within one class period. The film was also not overly graphic or factual giving more of a broad view of the situation and a case study of a particular situation, but not many overall facts. The fact that the case was won at the end of the film gave it more credibility as well. The film would be good as an education tool if it was used to introduce a certain topic then more study would have to be done on the matrix of problems introduced in the film for it to be particularly informative.

The main aspect of the film that could use improvement was the fact that the film came off as a biography on Judi’s life. It was meant to be more personal but I thought it could have gone more into the environmental aspects and not as much of the personal aspects of her life. The shortness of the film also limited the amount of information that was conveyed. I would have been interested to know more about EarthFirst as well.

This film was directed toward an audience who had a background in some of the issues in order to connect different facts and groups mentioned. Without some interest in the cause, the film would not have been as effective because of the extreme informality of it. The film targets certain “protectorate” groups [ie. FBI] but makes a strong case against them thus it is trying to shake the ground of conservatists who trust these groups.

Educationally, the film works well as a case study point and in conjunction with other films and research into the groups involved and issues. It is a film centered more on personal and societal issues rather than factual knowledge so a few more facts may be helpful to make it more educational, even if they are just printed across the screen in short anecdotes.

The points of intervention suggested by the film include encouraging a distrust or wariness of certain organization that we may believe as there to protect us, a modification of the legal process to speed it up and create a more fair system, a protection of the right of dissent, and civil rights for sustainability fighters. The film does not suggest many points of intervention and focuses most on the matrix of problems.

This film did not go into too much detail about the different organizations mentioned so I wanted to look more into some of them. I began with [|EarthFirst!]. For one, I learned that EarthFirst considers itself a movement not an organization and it was interesting to note that though they are attempting to achieve the same results as scientists and other professional environmentalists, that they seem to view these people with contempt or a lack of respect rather than trying to work together with them. I was especially interested to note that they make a comment to arrests on their website, that it is an option but should be weighed carefully whether it is the correct one. A few of the locations EarthFirst is prominent are Britain, Humboldt, Leeds, Montreal, Netherlands, Phillipines, Philadelphia, Prague, Katuah, Santa Cruz, Sierra Nevada, and Northern California. I was also interested in knowing how the case continued with the attempted murder. I found information from [|September of 2010] that stated the FBI intended to destroy the evidence of the bomb that injured Judi Bari and Darryl Cherney. According to an article by [|Climate Voices] they were given 30 days to determine its fate and the judge was going to consult with the previous jury but it was ruled that the evidence could be destroyed even though the case was never solved. The problem is that the FBI won’t reopen the case or turn the evidence over.