My first article as a soon-to-be contributor to Worldchanging. It is in an area that is of interest to me, because while I love film production, I also remember a lot of the associated waste and excess. Luckily, there are a number of groups who are deciding to look after their impact on the environment. New Zealand is notable, as is British Columbia, and a few of the big players in Hollywood have been silently working away behind the scenes. Perhaps in the not so distant future a sustainable standard will be created within the motion picture industry that will do for the environment, what Lucas did for sound.

“I think one movie can make a difference”.

Michael Moore

Over the weekend I watched Michael Moore’s most recent movie Sicko. It follows the workings of the US healthcare and reflects on the country’s aversion to universal healthcare. (Warning: There are many kitsch clips of socialist musical numbers). The US is compared and contrasted to the likes of France, Canada and England. As Che Guevara’s daughter notes, it is a little difficult to understand why a country that is several times wealthier than Cuba does not take better care of its people.

And while Moore might get criticized for breaking US trade laws when he took a group of sick American citizens to a Cuban hospital for treatment at no cost, it is hard not to admire his audacity for pulling attention to what is clearly an under reported problem in one of the wealthiest countries of the world, and in a society that is allowing its wealth gap to widen to the detriment of its poorest and least reprensented people.