Film: A Sea Change (dir by Barbara Ettinger, Niijii Films, 2009, 86 min)

Films about Environmental degregadation can be boring, technical or depressing... but sometimes they are uplifting and inspiring, and this is such a film.

A Sea Change follows the journey of retired history teacher Sven Huseby on his quest to discover what is happening to the world’s oceans.

After reading Elizabeth Kolbert’s November 2006 article The Darkening Sea in The New Yorker magazine, Sven becomes obsessed with the rising acidity of the oceans and what this “sea change” bodes for mankind. His quest takes him to Alaska, California, Washington, and Norway as he uncovers a worldwide crisis that most people are unaware of. Speaking with oceanographers, marine biologists, climatologists, artists and policy experts, Sven discovers that global warming is only half the story of the environmental catastrophe that awaits us. Excess carbon dioxide is dissolving in our oceans, changing seawater chemistry. The increasing acidity of the water makes it difficult for tiny creatures at the bottom of the food web – such as the pteropods in the films – to form their shells. The effects could work their way up to the fish one billion people depend upon for their source of protein.

A Sea Change is also a touching portrait of Sven’s relationship with his grandchild Elias. As Sven keeps a correspondence with the little boy, he mulls over the world that he is leaving for future generations. A disturbing and essential companion piece to films such as Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth, A Sea Change brings home the indisputable fact that our lifestyle is changing the earth, despite our rhetoric or wishful thinking.

A Sea Change is the first documentary about ocean acidification, directed by Barbara Ettinger and co-produced by Sven Huseby of Niijii Films. While emphasizing new scientific information, the film is also a beautiful paen to the ocean world and an intimate story of a Norwegian-American family whose heritage is bound up with the sea.

More information can be found on the film's website.

“There are massive unrecognized changes of geologic scale taking place in the ocean. Ocean chemistry is being altered on a scale not seen for millions of years. And we don’t know what the consequences will be.”
- Dr. Edward L. Miles, Virginia & Prentice Bloedel Professor of Marine & Public
Affairs, University of Washington

“We put the equivalent of 118 billion VW Bugs’ worth of CO2 into the ocean for the last 200 years and 43% of that has happened just in the last 20 years and it’s growing exponentially. You as we start to project out to the future it really gets scary.” - Dr. Chris Sabine, oceanographer, Natl. Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

“A Sea Change could not be more timely. I believe acidification of our oceans is actually a greater threat to our survival than is temperature or sea level rise, the conventional ‘global warming’ threats. Acidification is confusing and difficult to even imagine for most people — we need your film.” - Rob Moir, PhD., Executive Director, Ocean River Institute

"A Sea Change offers a searching, emotionally powerful look at ocean acidification. This problem is sometimes called the "evil twin" of climate change, and many of us regard it as an existential threat to the future of fishing. The story is full of heart, scientifically accurate, and lyrical. It also offers good reason for hope, which is indispensable in the face of such a huge challenge." - Brad Warren, Sustainable Fisheries Partnership

Film: Earth Days: The Seeds of a Revolution (Robert Stone, 2008, Zeitgeist Films, 102 min)

Director Robert Stone interviews 9 of the key thought leaders behind the emergence of the late 20th century United States branch of the modern Environmental Movement, showing how a sequence of events initially, primarily using new laws passed in the 1970s, reversed the upward trend in industrial pollution. But now the movement has plateaued and is not keeping pace with global population growth and consumption growth, once again causing grave concern that industrial civilization could lead to dangerous undermining of the ecosystem during the next 30 years. Some of these thinkers now advocate advanced design for comfortable lower-impact living, others advocate transformation of lifestyles away from materialism and towards bio-regionalism.

A thoughtful film.

Film: The Most Dangerous Man In America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers (dir by Judih Ehrlich and Rick Goldsmith, ITVS, 2009)

I just saw a magnificent documentary. It's about how a pro-military decision-analyst at the RAND Corporation had a series of experiences (first as a child, then at the Pentagon, in Vietnam, and at meetings of activist groups) that made him decide that the U.S. Congress and the American Public had no true idea of the real policy of war-making the United States had pursued in Vietnam for decades, and that he would chage that. His photocopying of a Pentagon study eventually set in motion events that brought down a U.S. President (the impeachment and resignation of Richard Nixon), led to a critical U.S. Supreme Court decision on Freedom of the Press, and contributed to ending a major debacle and military quagmire. If you want to see a film about a true patriot, who risked life-in-prison and gave up his career to serve the higher values this country should be about, see this documentary by Judith Ehrlich and Rick Goldsmith.

The Most Dangerous Man in America Website