Sustainability Film Series

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CITIZEN GEORGE presents the life and work of Philadelphia-based Quaker activist George Lakey, a non-violent revolutionary who has worked his entire life for justice and peace, guided by his ideal of societal transformation. The film moves back and forth in time, highlighting specific events of George’s activist life—including fighting for civil rights, anti-Vietnam War activism, LGBTQ rights, human rights in Sri Lanka and climate justice. In addition to detailing his life as an activist, CITIZEN GEORGE tells George’s personal journey as a husband, father and out gay man. Animated sequences, inspired by graphic novels, illustrate scenes from George’s life. His story provides life-giving lessons to those struggling to make sense of the current troubling political climate, illuminate a path forward, and inspire those willing to work for change to face today’s moment.

CITIZEN GEORGE builds a life, layer by layer. It is a portrait of a rebel with a mission and an uncanny skill for serving up whatever the situation needs—fire or water, heat or cold—by asking himself, “Where can I make a contribution? Where am I led?” 

A Witch Story takes on the challenge of retelling and deconstructing the Salem Witch Trials of 1692, one of the historical episodes most deeply rooted in American pop culture imaginaries, to reveal its connection to contemporary witch hunts and examine women’s  struggles through feminist lens.

Alice’s quest to find the truth about Martha and the Salem’s trials, introduces us to a more unknown and significantly bloodier episode: the Great Witch Hunts of Europe and the Americas, which led to the deaths of roughly 50,000 people, mostly women, between the 16th and 18th centuries.

Water For Life tells the story of three extraordinary individuals: Berta Cáceres, a leader of the Lenca people in Honduras; Francisco Pineda, a subsistence farmer in El Salvador; and Alberto Curamil, an Indigenous Mapuche leader in Chile, all of whom refused to let government supported industry and transnational corporations take their water and redirect it to mining, hydroelectric projects or large scale agriculture. Despite reassurances from companies and the authorities, they knew what lay ahead: contaminated water, environmental devastation, and the destruction of their communities.

It is a story of courage and determination, betrayal and corruption, death threats and murder, and of unexpected victories in the countryside and in the courts. It is a story that asks how economic development can grow in harmony with environmental protections. Above all, Water For Life illuminates a growing recognition of Indigenous rights and a rising demand for corporate responsibility and environmental justice that’s being seen around the world. It is a story that begins and ends with water.

Our investigation opens with a glimpse, partly animated, of the essential uses of plastic and the flood of single-use, disposable plastic debris entering the ocean. Narrator Peter Coyote asks, “how do we keep the benefits that plastics provide, but protect ourselves from the negative impacts…and why does this waste continue to grow despite so many efforts to reduce it?” Our search for the true headwaters of the deluge goes upstream from the ocean to where millions of tons of plastic are being produced with limited oversight—a discovery leading to the politics that brought it into being.

It’s estimated over 8 million tons of this disposable stuff enters the ocean each year, forming massive gyres the size of Texas. Hundreds of species including seabirds, sea turtles, marine mammals and fish are killed each year after mistaking it for food. And scientists now understand the gyres account for only about one percent of the ocean plastic.

A recent study found that 99.8 percent of plastic that’s entered the ocean since 1950 has sunk below the surface, with 10,000 times more plastic particles found on the seafloor. But the problem doesn’t stop there. The Center for Biological Diversity estimates that fish in the North Pacific ingest 12,000 to 24,000 tons of plastic each year, which transfers up the food chain to bigger fish, marine mammals, and then to human seafood consumers. A study by researchers from U.C Davis found that a quarter of the fish at markets in California contained plastic in their guts, mostly in the form of plastic microfibers.

VIRULENT: THE VACCINE WAR explores the highly contentious, emotionally fraught firestorm surrounding vaccines, charting the collision between scientists and charlatans, truth and lies.

Public health experts' worries that the coronavirus vaccine could create fear of all vaccines appear to have been borne out by the resurgence of previously eradicated childhood diseases including measles and pertussis. Doctors admit that they have not learned how to effectively communicate science to their patients, leaving them susceptible to the influence of expertly manipulated and increasing extreme messaging on social media platforms. In post-pandemic America, the vaccine controversy continues to cut across political, cultural, racial and socio-economic lines, engulfing doctors and patients as well as conspiracy theorists, celebrities, influencers, and opportunists looking to cash in. The film also takes a close look at the ways in which minorities are targeted by anti-vaccine misinformation.

Taking us deep into these opposing worlds are Dr. Paul Offit, one of the world's preeminent virologists; Dr. Peter Salk, Jonas Salk's physician son; Arthur Caplan, PhD, founder of NYU's Division of Bioethics; New York Times columnist Kevin Roose, who writes about how bad science spreads online; NBC News reporter Brandy Zadrozny, who has exposed how anti-vaxxers target grieving parents and has herself become a target; and the voices of many former vaccine skeptics, including those who lost children to vaccine-preventable illnesses.

VIRULENT is an invitation to think again, exposing the myths and laying bare the facts about vaccine science, its history and what it will take to eradicate the world's most deadly diseases.

Seen primarily through the eyes of women and children of color living through housing insecurity in California's Alameda County, A RISING TIDE aims to identify how and why homelessness occurs.

The film juxtaposes the perspectives of various stakeholders affected by the "affordable-housing industrial complex," capturing the adversity faced by homeless families in Oakland and exploring the plight of service providers and social workers on the frontlines of the housing crisis.

In the Bay Area minimum wage employment doesn't afford families—particularly those of color—the basic necessities for raising their children in decent housing with childcare, food, transportation, and adequate health care. The consequences of this deprivation increase wildly when homelessness is prolonged due to systemic failures and policy-based deficiencies.

The film highlights the historical context that has directly caused and continues to exacerbate the demographics of segregation in California.

Ultimately, A RISING TIDE aims to shift the narrative, challenging a commonly held misconception—including by some professionals working on affordable housing solutions—that unhoused individuals are all addicts or suffering from mental health issues. It also asks what considerations should be addressed to serve the unhoused when cities and counties are planning new housing.