“If we can’t raise the money needed to make our documentary then our documentary shouldn’t be made.” ~ Phelim McAleer
James Delingpole
The Telegraph [UK]
20 February 2012
Three of FrackNation's executive producers in Long Beach
Shale gas is the miracle which will transform the world. In America it’s already doing so. The Poles are going mad for it, too. So why are we so reluctant to exploit this abundant resource over here?
One of the main reasons is the disinformation sowed by films like the highly tendentious Gasland. (The one where the tap catches fire). And that’s why I’m so looking forward to seeing the independent movie which will counter this propaganda and set the record straight. It’s by Phelim McAleer and Ann McElhinney – the team which brought you Not Evil Just Wrong – and it’s called FrackNation.
At this stage I ought to declare an interest. Not only do I appear in the film but I am in fact one of its executive producers. The latter sounds very grand but it’s not: for the price of a dollar, you could be an executive producer too…
The article continues at The Telegraph.
Related: At The Daily Mail [UK]: Americans back pro-drilling documentary instead of film about execution of ‘innocent’ cop killer
So which of these two American film projects do you think can attract enough cash and public support to make it onto the big screen?
A heart-rending movie about the supposed innocence of Troy Davis, executed in Georgia last year amid a worldwide outcry from opponents of the death penalty? Or a hard-headed documentary that aims to show that the practice of “fracking” (hydraulic fracturing), which the Obama administration has said causes groundwater pollution, is a thoroughly good thing?
Read the news or watch television coverage about either of these issues and you’d be certain that Troy Davis Lives would be coming to a cinema near your home shortly while the very notion of FrackNation would be consigned to oblivion.
After all, everyone knows that redneck states in the Deep South routinely execute innocent black men while Big Oil and Gas ruthlessly exploit poor Americans and ravage pristine wildernesses for commercial gain, don’t they?
Well, it seems that ordinary Americans beg to differ. Both Rebellion Films, planning to make Troy Davis Lives, and Ann and Phelim Films, trying to get FrackNation off the ground, are using Kickstarter.com to raise funds.
At the time of writing, after 57 days five people have offered a total of $106 for the making of Troy Davis Lives. In a countdown reminiscent of the one that took place before Davis’s execution, Kickstarter is now featuring how many hours (currently 63) are left.
By contrast, after 15 days soliciting cash, a total of while 1,282 people have pledged $90,715 for FrackNation, an average of just over $70 per donor and well over half of the $150,000 target…
…Fox has been making Gasland II, funded by HBO to the tune of an reported $750,000 and due to air this year. In the meantime, McAleer and McElhinney, along with co-producer Magda Segieda, have been busy travelling to small towns in Pennsylvania like Hickory, McMurray, Dimock, Hop Bottom, Waymart and Honesdale as well as to Calicoon, New York – as well as Warsaw in Poland.
They’ve been talking those on both sides of the issue – including large numbers of the people most affected who are enthusiastically in favour of fracking…
The complete article, with video, is at The Daily Mail.
Ann McElhinney and Phelim McAleer. Photo: AP. click on the image to enlarge
CAJ Disclosure: Members of this blog are also executive producers of FrackNation.
Update: Also at The Telegraph: National Trust comes out against ‘public menace’ of wind farms
The National Trust is now “deeply sceptical” of wind power, its chairman said as he launched an outspoken attack on the “public menace” of turbines destroying the countryside.
…campaigners argue that wind turbines ruin the landscape and are less efficient than other forms of electricity because more back up is required for when the wind is not blowing.
This weekend The Telegraph revealed the full extent of lobbying by Britain’s wind industry.
CAJ note: As far as we can surmise, then, the “green” lobbies of the Left would have us sitting in the dark, piled under our pets to keep warm in the winter, and perched over a in a hole in the ground in which to defecate, just like our ancestors did before sanitation and comfort were introduced to the Western world. While some of us at this blog are old enough to remember the use of outhouses, our younger or more urban readers probably have no idea what they’ve missed.
Update: Press Sec. Carney: Obama Didn’t Turn Down Keystone Pipeline .
Just to refresh your memory, Obama rejects Keystone pipeline from Canada to Texas
H/T The Blacksphere and the Refounders, both on Facebook.
