The CAS Symposium Against Indifference and Ashland Center for Nonviolence are co-sponsoring a film series that will feature three films that are free and open to the public during the month of October.
The films will be shown in the Hawkins-Conard Student Center Auditorium and will feature a brief discussion following each film.
The film “Waste Land” will be shown on Monday, Oct. 5, at 7 p.m. while the film “Nerve: How a Small Kentucky Town Led the Fight to Safely Dismantle the World’s Chemical Weapons” will be presented on Monday, Oct. 12, at 7 p.m. and the film “Nuclear Savage: The Islands of Secret Project 4.1” will be presented on Monday, Oct. 19, at 7 p.m.
The film “Waste Land” follows renowned artist Vik Muniz as he journeys to his native Brazil and the world’s largest garbage dump, Jardim Gramacho, located on the outskirts of Rio de Janeiro. There he photographs an eclectic band of “catadores”—self-designated pickers of recyclable materials. Muniz’s initial objective was to “paint” the catadores with garbage.
However, his collaboration with these inspiring characters as they recreate photographic images of themselves out of garbage reveals both the dignity and despair of the catadores as they begin to reimagine their lives. “Waste Land” offers stirring evidence of the transformative power of art and the alchemy of the human spirit.
The film “Nerve: How a Small Kentucky Town Led the Fight to Safely Dismantle the World’s Chemical Weapons” (with original score by Ben Sollee) tells the 25-year David vs. Goliath story of how a humble Vietnam vet and carpenter Craig Williams (2006 winner of the Goldman Prize – the “green Nobel” – for his work), galvanized his town to break down political barriers, spark a worldwide movement and take on the Pentagon to stop dangerous chemical weapons incineration for the sake of the environment and human health around the world. This inspiring story with small-town roots but profound global impact has the potential to empower ordinary people to take on the most overwhelming environmental challenges successfully, with fresh eyes and renewed vigor.
The film “Nuclear Savage: The Islands of Secret Project 4.1” by Adam Jonas Horowitz is a shocking political exposé, and an intimate ethnographic portrait of Pacific Islanders struggling for survival, dignity and justice after decades of top secret human radiation experiments conducted on them by the U.S. government. On March 1, 1954, the U.S. detonated a hydrogen bomb in the Castle Bravo test at Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands. The largest atomic test blast conducted by the United States, the yield of the Castle Bravo bomb was 1000 times greater than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima.
