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Films are listed below alphabetically. Click on the film name for a short description and a link to the Making it Home Film Festival(s) where the film will be screened.
- A Drop of Life
- America's Dairyland (Wisconsin "short" )
- America's Lost Landscape
- An End to Slim Pickings (Wisconsin "short" )
- Arctic Tale
- Being Caribou
- Cape Wind
- Earl's Canoe
- Finding Farley
- Garbage Dreams
- Getting Them Home (Wisconsin "short" )
- Ghost Bird
- Green Fire (short trailer)
- Greening of Southie
- Holy Land, WI (Wisconsin "short" )
- Hubley Shorts
- Hunger Season
- Mad City Chickens
- Men of the Lake
- Milking the Rhino
- More Jam, More Jobs (Wisconsin "short" )
- Never Cry Wolf
- Northern Ice, Golden Sun
- Our Daily Bread
- Plastics One Through Seven(Wisconsin "short" )
- Ratatouille
- Solitary Life of Cranes
- Sweetland
- The Plow that Broke the Plains
- The River
- Upstream Battle
- What's On Your Plate?
- Wild New York
- Yes Men Fix the World
- Yes We Can
- Young At Heart
A Drop of Life
Directed by Shalini Kantayya (2007, 17 min.)
A science fiction film that raises very real questions about the global impact of water privatization, A Drop of Life tells of two women-a teacher in a rural Indian village and an American corporate executive- whose lives intersect as they confront a lack of access to clean drinking water. Awarded Best Short at Palm Beach International, the Audience Choice Award at the Rain Bird Intelligent Use of Water film competition, and a Crystal Dior Nomination.
- Baraboo: Friday, March 5
Directed by Kevin Gibbons, UW-Madison Nelson Institute (2009, 2:19 min.)
How white is our milk? How American is our cheese - in fact, who actually makes it? More and more of Wisconsin's farmer Johns are working with farmer Juans. Come on a tour of "America's Dairyland" and meet today's milk producers and cheese packers - the new faces of dairy production. Sí, the Wisconsin countryside is changing.
Wisconsin "shorts" will be screened before feature-length films throughout the Making it Home Film Festivals. Click here to watch the film!
America's Lost Landscape
Directed by David O'Shields (2006, 60 min.)
America's Lost Landscape: The Tallgrass Prairie tells the rich and complex story of one of the most astonishing alterations of nature in human history. During the Euro-American settlement of the 19th century, America's 240 million acres of tallgrass prairie were steadily transformed into farmland. This film examines the record of human struggle, triumph and defeat embedded in America's prairie history.
- Dodgeville: March 13
Directed by S. Brewster (2009, 2:11 min.)
Madison is known for the second largest farmers market in North America and a love of all things local. But how "local" is our food -- really? Meet a community of gleaners who call Madison home and know just where to find apples, pears, grapes, raspberries and even kiwis in backyards, vacant lots, university walkways and gardens across the city.
Wisconsin "shorts" will be screened before feature-length films throughout the Making it Home Film Festivals. Click here to watch the film!
Arctic Tale
Directed by Adam Ravetch and Sarah Robertson (2007, 90 min.)
The frozen Arctic is home to polar bears and walruses, two very different types of animals whose struggle to survive against the elements is only being made more difficult by a changing climate. Directors Adam Ravetech and Sarah Robertson filmed walruses and polar bears in the Arctic for 15 years in order to create this amazing story about the lives of Nanu the baby polar bear and a newborn walrus dubbed Seelah. The film chronicles these creatures' lives from the babies' first days of existence, through two years of training in hunting and fighting by their mother. The rising arctic temperatures force these animals to adapt and to fight for their survival in a changing world.
- Chequamegon Bay: April 22
Directed by Leanne Allison and Diana Wilson (2004, 72 min.)
Allison, an environmentalist, and Heuer, a wildlife biologist, follow a herd of 120,000 caribou on foot, across 900 Miles of Arctic tundra, in order to raise awareness of threats to the caribou's survival. At stake is the herd's delicate habitat, which is threatened by proposed petroleum and natural gas development in the herd's calving grounds in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
- Chequamegon Bay: April 24
Directed by Robbie Gemmel and Daniel Coffin
Cape Cod has become the center of a heated debate about America's fledgling offshore wind industry. Cape Wind explores the trials and tribulations of implementing a massive energy project and explores how a community of active citizens struggles to protect itself and provide for its future.
Production on this full-length film is not yet complete (as of February 2010). Visit the film's Website for more information.
Earl's Canoe
Directed by Thomas Vennum with Charles Weber (1999, 27 min.)
Earl Nyholm, a member of the Ojibwe Nation, is looking for just the right birch tree to make a traditional Ojibwe canoe. Along the way, he illuminates the Ojibwe's respect for nature and tradition. The sprit of the tree he chooses will become part of his canoe and will travel with him on his future journey.
Finding FarleyDirected by Leanne Allison and Karsten Heuer (2007, 62 min.)
Leanne and Karsten, along with their two-year-old toddler, paddle, portage, and sail for five months across Canada to meet ageing writer Farley Mowat. Their trip takes them though prairies, barrenlands and maritimes, stringing together the settings of many of the iconic author's books. This favorite took the top prize at the 2009 Banff Mountain Film Festival!
- Chequamegon Bay: April 24
Directed by Mai Iskander (2009, 82 min.)
Largely invisible and some 60,000 strong, Egypt's zaballeen collect and recycle 80 percent of Cairo's garbage. When the government hires foreign companies to remove trash instead, these citizens must fight to preserve their way of life and find new ways to advance society. Garbage Dreams follows three teenagers as they navigate toward an uncertain future and try to do right by their families. Winner of the Al Gore Reel Current Prize for environmental film.
- Dodgeville: March 12
Directed by Maggie Flamingo (2009, 2:16 min.)
They come with broken bodies, tattered wings, and little hope. Only commitment, passion, and loyalty will get them home. It's a love story...with a wild streak.
Wisconsin "shorts" will be screened before feature-length films throughout the Making it Home Film Festivals. Click here to watch the film!
Ghost Bird
Directed by Scott Crocker (2009, 85 min.)
Ghost Bird is a feature length documentary about an extinct giant woodpecker, a small town in Arkansas hoping to reverse it misfortunes, and the tireless odyssey of the bird-watchers and scientists searching for the Holy Grail of birds, the elusive Ivory-billed woodpecker. Click here to visit the film Website.
- Baraboo: March 7
- Dodgeville: March 13
- Milwaukee: April 17
- Chequamegon Bay: April 24
Directed by Steven Dunsky and David Steinke (2010 in production, 60 min.)
Well known for his seminal work, A Sand County Almanac, Aldo Leopold is perhaps the most respected leader in American conservation history. He has long been regarded as a gifted author, teacher, forester, outdoorsman, and land steward, but he is perhaps best known for recognizing the ethical dimension of people's relationship to the land and articulating it through prose so lyrical and universal that many have quickly understood and agreed with his reasoning. Green Fire provocatively examines Leopold's thinking, renewing his idea of a land ethic for a population facing 21st century ecological challenges. A short preview of "Green Fire" will be screened in advance of completion of the full-length film.
Greening of SouthieDirected by Ian Cheney (2008, 73 min.)
In the traditionally Irish-American working-class neighborhood of South Boston, a new kind of building has taken shape, but Boston's steel-toed union workers aren't sure they like it. Building Boston's first LEED Gold-certified "green" building turns out to be harder than anyone thought. Yet among the I-beams and brickwork emerges a small cadre of unlikely environmentalists who come to connect their work with the future of their children. From the director of King Corn.
- Dodgeville: March 12
- Chequamegon Bay: April 23
Directed by Merideth Beck Sayre (2009, 2:17 min.)
Frank Shadwald is a 77-year-old retired farmer who owns several hundred acres of valuable farm land in the Lower Wisconsin River Valley. But to Frank, his land is worth far more than money. There are fifteen ancient Native American effigy mounds located on his property, an important site of Native American culture-past and present. For the past twenty years, Frank has worked to preserve them. But what will happen to the land when Frank is not here to protect it?
Wisconsin "shorts" will be screened before feature-length films throughout the Making it Home Film Festivals. Click here to watch the film!
A Collection of Hubley Shorts
Directed by John and Faith Hubley
For decades John and Faith Hubley have provided some of the most beautiful, award-winning, and compelling environmental-themed animation anywhere. This showcase includes four short films, Whither Weather and Yes We Can, by Faith Hubley and Northern Ice, Golden Sun and Children of the Sun, by John Hubley.
The Hunger Season
Directed by Beadie Finzi (2008, 60 min.)
The Hunger Season traces the impact of global competition for resources through the story of Justice, a villager in Swaziland, who would love nothing more than to grow food on his own land. Drought and climate change have made this impossible, and his village is dependent on USAID food that filmmaker Beadie Finzi traces to its roots in Wisconsin soil, reminding us of how closely connected we are to situations and people halfway around the world.
- Baraboo: March 7
Directed by by Tashai Lovington & Robert Lughai (2008)
A Madison family plunges headfirst into the art of chicken keeping amidst mixed animated and live action shots of the inseparable duo of chickens and eggs. Chickens were once a regular element of many a family's lives in the U.S., and remain so throughout the world. But the chicken way of life largely disappeared in this country due to the rise of industrial farming. This film chronicles the story of chicken-keeping returning to a community as people rediscover the experience of keeping the birds in their backyards.
- Baraboo: March 6
Directed by Aaron I. Naar (2007, 12 min.)
Founded in 2000 B.C., the Bolivian village of Funaca Tintamaria, one of the oldest and poorest communities in Latin America, is currently on the brink of extinction. Narrated by the community's ex-leader, Daniel Moricio Choque, the film artfully recounts the history of their community, customs, and current problems: their continuous poverty, lack of land and representation, the contamination of Lake Poopo, and the impact of global warming. An official selection of the 2008 Hot Docs film festival in Toronto.
- Milwaukee: April 18
Directed by David E. Simpson (2008, 83 min.)
The Maasai of Kenya and Namiba's Himba- two of the world's oldest cattle cultures- are emerging from a century of "white man's conservation," which turned their lands into game reserves and elevated the exoticism of wildlife at the expense of their livelihoods. This is the first major documentary to explore conservation from the perspective of people living near wild animals and explore whether it's possible for locals to benefit in "milking the rhino" for ecotourism profit. A complex, intimate portrait of people at the forefront of community-based conservation: a revolution turning poachers into preservationists.
More Jam, More Jobs: One Woman's Attempt to Convince Twelve Sororities to Buy Local
Directed by Jesse Mursky-Fuller (2009, 2:12 min.)
When Chi Omega sorority sister Jessica Halpern finds out that buying high quality, locally produced products can help create jobs for homeless people in her town, she takes matters into her own hands. Follow Jessica and her tray of crackers as she tries to change sorority consumption patterns, and the local commodity food chain, one sister at a time - by buying Porchlight jam.
Wisconsin "shorts" will be screened before feature-length films throughout the Making it Home Film Festivals. Click here to watch the film!
Never Cry Wolf
Directed by Carroll Ballard (1983, 105 min.)
An extraordinary film based on the autobiography of Farley Mowat, Never Cry Wolf is the tale of a young biologist sent into the wilderness to gather proof of the wolves' ongoing destruction of caribou herds. The more he learns, the more he comes to fear not the wolves, but the hunters out to exploit them and the wilderness they inhabit. Director Carroll Ballard captures the spiritual quality of the human-animal bond and the great lengths humans will go to study and preserve their animal kin.
- Chequamegon Bay: April 24
Directed by Faith Hubley (2001, 10 min.)
The 25th and final solo film completed by Faith Hubley, Northern Ice, Golden Sun is a lyrical visual poem to environmentalism and to the Inuits' attachment to the land, and their ability to adapt to the natural world. The film will be screened along with three other short films by husband and wife team, Faith and John Hubley, known for their experimental animations dealing with themes of the earth's environment and its human inhabitants.
- Chequamegon Bay: April 24
Directed by Nikolaus Geyrhalter (2005, 92 min.)
An extraordinary wordless epic, Our Daily Bread trains an artistic lens on the global food system. From the planting and cultivating of crops to the treatment and slaughter of livestock, Nikolaus Geyrhalter's film offers a powerful exposition of the complex chain of people, landscapes, and technology that combine to bring food to our tables. Winner of awards at 10 festivals and official selection of over 40 others. (Warning: some images may be disturbing for children).
- Baraboo: March 6
Directed by Liese Dart (2009, 2:33 min.)
Meet Milly Zantow, 86, resident of North Freedom, Wisconsin and an environmental hero - at one point she was the only person sorting plastic in America. Her very simple question & revolution led to years of tenacious advocacy that turned the heads of the EPA and led to a national recycling policy - a veritable plastics revolution.
Wisconsin "shorts" will be screened before feature-length films throughout the Making it Home Film Festivals. Click here to watch the film!
Millie Zantow will be recognized for her achievements at a special event in Baraboo on opening night of the Making it Home Film Festival, March 5th. See full schedule.
Ratatouille
Directed by Brad Bird and Jan Pinkava (2007, 111 min.)
Remy is a young rat in the French countryside who arrives in Paris, only to find out that his cooking idol is dead. When he makes an unusual alliance with a restaurant's new garbage boy, the culinary and personal adventures begin despite Remy's family's skepticism and the rat-hating world of humans.
- Chequamegon Bay: April 24
Directed by Eva Weber (2008, 27 min.)
People engage with landscapes in a variety of ways and from many different perspectives. Eva Weber explores perhaps one of the most ignored perspectives, hidden in plain sight in almost every big city and developing landscape around the world. Capturing images not for the faint of heart (or acrophobic), Weber bravely ventures high above London to discover its world of crane operators. What she discovers in Solitary Life of Cranes is a complex relationship between man and machine, executing sweeping movements with balletic precision and in the process reshaping the landscape below.
- Chequamegon Bay: April 23
Directed by Ali Selim (2005, 110 min.)
Inge arrives in Minnesota in 1920 to marry the young Norwegian farmer Olaf, but her German heritage and lack of official immigration papers make her an object of suspicion in the small town. But when a neighbor's farm is threatened by foreclosure, Olaf takes a stand and the community questions its behavior toward the young couple.
- Chequamegon Bay: April 23
Directed by Pare Lorentz (1936, 25 min.)
During the Great Depression, legendary director Pare Lorentz captured some of the most revealing portraits ever made of environmental devastation. The Plow that Broke the Plains served as a wake-up call to those Americans unaware of the deprivations of the Dust Bowl and the toll of uncontrolled farming upon the land and people of the Great Plains.
- Baraboo: March 5
Directed by Pare Lorentz (1938, 31 min.)
A landmark in the history of documentary film, The River combines stunning visuals, a magnificent score by Virgil Thomson, and Pare Lorentz's moving narration to paint a vivid portrait of the Mississippi River and the effects of deforestation and flooding throughout the Mississippi River valley.
- Baraboo: March 5
Directed by Ben Kampas (2008, 59 min.)
On the Klamath River in northern California, Native American tribes have spent decades fighting to preserve their traditional fishing rights from the threats of damming and agriculture. Yet the battle is not a simple story of right and wrong. In an era when carbon emissions and global warming are of paramount concern, hydroelectric power offers one of the cleanest sources of energy available. Ultimately, Upstream Battle offers hope that even in the most complex environmental challenges, there may be room for compromise and constructive outcomes.
- Dodgeville: March 11
- Milwaukee: April 18
- Chequamegon Bay: April 23
Directed by Catherine Gund (2009, 73 min.)
In this rollicking film about kids and food politics, best friends Sadie and Safiyah, two eleven-year-old African-American girls, explore their place in the food chain. With the camera as their companion, they take a close look at food systems in New York City and its surrounding areas. The girls talk to each other, food activists, farmers, new friends, storekeepers, their families, and the viewer, in their quest to understand what's on all of our plates.
- Baraboo: March 6
- Dodgeville: March 13
- Milwaukee: April 18
- Chequamegon Bay: April 23
Directed by Adam Welz (2009, 24 min.)
In a place as densely populated as New York City, sightings of coyotes and red-tailed hawks give human denizens of the city a renewed sense of kinship with their non-human cousins. Filmmaker and avid birder Adam Welz brings some of New York City's most dedicated and unexpected urban-wildlife buffs to the screen, along with the hawks, kestrels, and peregrine falcons they observe, follow, and protect.
- Chequamegon Bay: April 24
Directed by Andy Bichlbaum, Mike Bonanno, and Kurt Engfehr (2009, 90 min.)
The Yes Men (professional rabble-rousers Andy Bichlbaum and Mike Bonanno) are back. This time around they take on Dow Chemical, Exxon-Mobil, and others in this combination true story and razor-edged, screwball comedy that exposes how corporate greed is destroying the planet. Come see the only film in the festival that managed to knock $2 billion off the stock value of a single corporation. A selection of the 2009 Sundance, Berlin and Hot Docs Film Festivals and winner of the Audience Award at the Berlin Film Festival.
- Baraboo: March 7
- Dodgeville: March 14
Directed by Faith Hubley (1989, 10 min.)
The Earth is being plundered and Gaia (Earth Mother) is dying. By uniting in a common goal, men and women help Gaia heal herself. Music composed by Don Christensen, in the first of many collaborations with Faith Hubley. Voices by Michael Ontkean and Jamie Smith.
- Chequamegon Bay: April 22
Directed by Stephen Walker (108 min.)
Get ready to rock with the most entertaining golden oldies you will ever meet in the senior citizen's choir Young@Heart. With a show only weeks away, they must learn a slate of new songs ranging from James Brown to Coldplay. The chorus' director leads them through tough rehearsals, proving that rock and roll can be hard work--especially if you're hard of hearing! Climaxing in a triumphant performance, their inspiring story celebrates the unbreakable bonds of friendship and the life-affirming power of music.
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A selection of these "shorts" will be screened at the Making it Home Film Festivals. They were produced by students at UW-Madison as part of a course taught in conjunction with the Nelson Institute's Tales from Planet Earth film festival. Learn more about the Environmental Filmmaking Workshop...
Screenings listed with local Making it Home Film Festival schedules: