One showing only! Wednesday, Aug 15th 2012 at 6:30pm at the Loft Cinema, 3233 E. Speedway

$8.00 in advance at Summit Hut, Antigone Books, and the Tucson Audubon Nature Shop
$10.00 at the door and online at http://www.sonorandesert.org

The Wild & Scenic Film Festival brings together a selection of films from the annual festival held each January in Nevada City, CA, which is now in its 10th year! The films speak to the environmental concerns and celebrations of our planet. “Films featured at Wild & Scenic give people a sense of place,” says Tour Manager Lori Van Laanen. “In our busy lives, it’s easy to get disconnected from our role in the global ecosystem. When we realize that the change we need in this world begins with us, we can start making a difference.”

This event will inspire the people of Tucson to go out and make a difference in the community. Because of engaged citizens who were motivated by what they saw in last year’s featured film, Bag It, the City of Tucson is now seeking solutions to reduce plastic bag consumption!

This year’s slate of films is bound to be just as motivating and entertaining. Mining Patagonia explores the issues and consequences that an open pit mine would impose on this environmentally rich yet fragile town just an hour south of Tucson. Connecting the Gems follows two hikers as they traverse the northern Rockies, seeking out wildlife corridors and identifying the challenges faced by wildlife as they journey between wildland “gems.” In Meet the Beetle we see how even the tiniest of critters plays an important role in keeping our world a vibrant place and how school children can get engaged in conservation in a powerful way.

The festival is a natural extension of the work of the Coalition for Sonoran Desert Protection. The Coalition, comprised of 41 conservation and community groups, works to create a community where ecosystem health is important, nature and healthy wild animal populations have value, and where visitors, children and future generations can all drink clean water, breathe clean air, and find wild places to roam.

This year’s festival is once again being held in conjunction with Tucson Audubon Society’s annual Bird & Wildlife Festival. Visitors from all over the world will be converging on Tucson for a week of birding and wildlife-related activities and the Coalition is excited to share the film festival as one of the featured evening programs.

Special thanks go out to local event sponsors Summit Hut and Betts Printing, the event’s major national sponsor Patagonia, as well as other local and national sponsors.

For more information contact Gabe Wigtil, gabe.wigtil@sonorandesert.org, 520-388-9925 or visit www.sonorandesert.org.

Americans use 60,000 plastic bags every five minutes, disposable bags that they throw away without much thought. But where is “away?” Where do the bags and other plastics end up, and at what cost to the environment, marine life and human health?

Bag It follows “everyman” Jeb Berrier as he navigates our plastic world. Jeb is an average American who decides to take a closer look at our cultural love affair with plastics. Jeb’s journey in this documentary film starts with simple questions: Are plastic bags really necessary? What are plastic bags made from? What happens to plastic bags after they are discarded? What he learns quickly grows far beyond plastic bags.

Bag It makes it clear that it is time for a paradigm shift. Join Jeb as he meets with people who fought the American Chemistry Council lobby that spent more than a million dollars fighting the Seattle bag fee; as he interviews a man sailing the Pacific in a boat made of plastic to raise awareness about our ocean’s health; as he gets tested to determine the levels of chemicals in his own body; and as he welcomes his baby into the world, a world he hopes we can leave with a little less plastic and in a little better shape for the next generation.

“Think about it—why would you make something that you’re going to use for a few minutes out of a material that’s basically going to last forever, and you’re just going to throw it away? What’s up with that?” — Jeb Berrier

Back on the Big Island of Hawaii, one of the larger supermarkets ((KTA) discourages plastic bag use, and credits each customer 5 cents for providing their own shopping bag to carry their groceries home. And in Europe people do tend to bring their own bags to shop with, and seem to rely less on plastic bags.

Per Gabe Wigtil, program & outreach associate for the Coalition for Sonoran Desert Protection:

“On February 28th the Tucson Mayor and Council will be holding a study session discussion on how to reduce single-use bag consumption in the city. This film event will feature a Call-to-Action for participants to encourage our community leaders to legislate the consumption of fewer disposable bags. That the City of Tucson is discussing the possibility of such a forward-thinking measure presents a great opportunity for this community to combat a major environmental problem.”

Watch the move trailer from the Loft website (click here), which reminded me of how much plastic is in our lives.

So think about this movie when you’re in the grocery line, and the clerk asks you “Paper or plastic?” and you say “Neither, I brought my own bag.”

And then you say “Bag it!”