Festival is mix of humor and significance
The 2007 EarthDance Environmental Film Festival provided a change from the traditional gloom message regarding the state of the earth.
Dubbed the “Short-Attention-Span” festival, the 18 films ranged from 2-minute shorts to longer features. Mixing humor with more serious issues proved a good formula to the audience in the Museum Collections building, eliciting laughter and wild clapping from the crowd.
“The EarthDance comes from a film fest in California. The producer has allowed us to screen it in Colorado,” said Marianne Martin, the associate director of the Environmental Center, the group that sponsored the event.
Shown over 3 days in Oakland California, the event was scaled down for CU.
The short film titled “Eric Prydz vs. Pink Floyd- Proper Education” featured a gang of young students breaking into London flats to change light bulbs, switch appliances, and otherwise save the planet, all to the remixed tune “Proper Education.”
“Spiders on Drugs” was a tongue-in-cheek 2-minute short film about the effects of drugs on spiders. The stoner spider, the crack spider and the LSD spider all had different ways to build their webs, characterized by the drug they were given.
Climbing shorts were interspersed throughout the festival, ranging from local, to Thailand, to southern Colorado.
IDEO, one of the world-leading design and innovation companies, showed an 8-minute documentary featuring employee ideas to integrate sustainability into professional practice and everyday life.
The overall feeling of the EarthDance festival was one of hope. Perhaps the environment is still salvageable, especially when taken with a good dose of humor and proactive attitudes.
“We are showing this in conjunction with Earth Day on Sunday, April 22,” Martin said.
Earth Day events are located around Boulder this weekend.
Wild Earth Saturday featuring Dirt Days
Where: NCAR Mesa Laboratory, 1850 Table Mesa Drive in Boulder
When: April 21; 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Featuring interactive booths from the Access Fund, La Sportiva and The Spot, among others, and the Dirt Days Challenge, a multi-sport outdoor adventure challenge.
Visit http://www.wildbear.org/ for more information.
CU’s Better Boulder Better World
Where: Boulder campus
When: April 21; 8:00 a.m. – 12 Noon
Volunteer with different organizations around Boulder. The event is put on by the Volunteer Clearing House in conjunction with I Volunteer Day.
Visit http://colorado.edu/vhc/BBBW/html.
5th Annual Wild Oats Earth Day 4K Run/Walk and Expo
Where: 29th Street Mall
When: April 22; 9 a.m.
Free warm-up and yoga, goody bags, water bottles and food for all runners and walkers.
Visit www.conservationcenter.org/events.html .
Contact Campus Press staff writer Kathleen Straney at Kathleen.Straney@thecampuspress.com.
