Own a Piece of "The Age of Stupid"

Click for articleONECLIMATE:  A sneak preview screening of the new climate change documentary “The Age of Stupid” can be seen on Tuesday, February 26 at  noon SLT at http://slurl.com/secondlife/OneClimate/144/68/26

Oscar-nominated Pete Postlethwaite (“In The Name of the Father,” “Brassed Off,” “Usual Suspects”) stars as an old man living in the devastated world of 2055.  He watches archived footage from 2007 and wonders “Why didn’t we stop climate change when we had the chance?”

Postlethwaite’s character lives in The Global Archive – a storage facility built in 2030 to protect humanity’s greatest achievements from the ravages of climate change.  He’s surrounded by all the artwork, films, science, etc., but has been alone for fifteen years.

Producers John Battsek (“One Day in September”) and Lizzie Gillett will be in-world to answer questions and discuss more about preventing runaway climate change.

This film is “crowd funded,” and 280 investors contributed and own a percentage of the film. All profits will be shared between the investors and crew, who are working for massively reduced rates.

Only 13 “shares” of this film are left.  The producers will be selling the final £5,000 (that’s British pound sterling, not Lindens) “shares” live in SL.

Previously named “Crude” while in production, this film has been three years in the making.  There are five mini stories within the film, all about global warming.  Filming has taken place in six countries (New Orleans, India, Nigeria, France, England and Iraq) and the film is due to be released in May 2008 at the Cannes Film Festival.

The film is directed by Franny Armstrong (“McLibel,” ‘Drowned Out’) with Spanner Films.  Armstrong has long been interested in the topics of the Greenhouse effect and global warming.  Her university thesis was entitled "Is the Human Species Suicidal?" which served as a blueprint for this film. Co-writer Mark Lynas of the film recently published a book entitled “Six Degrees – Our Future on a Hotter Planet.”

Postlethwaite has personally spoken out against the ever increasing dangers of climate change and has applied to have wind turbines installed on his own property.

“The stakes are very, very high.  They’re through the roof.  So when I looked at the subject and what the film is trying to do, there was no option really.  I had to do it.”

Other documentaries coming up are “Fields of Fuel” dealing with alternative energy and
‘The 11th Hour” starring Leonardo DiCaprio.  

Armstrong was asked about the other films on a recent Channel 4 News show.  Armstrong replied, “Well I think the whole denial of climate change works on all sorts of different levels and is one of the main problems of climate change is that we deny it on sorts of levels.  One of those ways we deny it is to say ‘Oh there are too many films on this subject.’  But it’s the most important subject probably of all time.  So the fact that there are two or three documentaries looking at it in different ways – I don’t see any problem at all.”

Further information about the film can be found on the Web site http://www.crudemovie.net/