Al Gore Presents REEL CURRENT Award at Nashville Film Festival

Former Vice President Al Gore made a surprise appearance at the Nashville Film Festival on Saturday April 21 to present the REEL CURRENT AWARD to Director Jennifer Baichwal for her film "Manufactured Landscapes" before the screening of the film at Regal Green Hills Cinema. "Manufactured Landscapes" focuses on the world and work of renowned artist Edward Burtynsky.

Nashville, TN (PRWEB) April 22, 2007 -- Former Vice President Al Gore made a surprise appearance at the Nashville Film Festival on Saturday, April 21 to present the REEL CURRENT AWARD to Director Jennifer Baichwal for her film "Manufactured Landscapes," before the screening of the film at Regal Green Hills Cinema. "Manufactured Landscapes" focuses on the world and work of renowned artist Edward Burtynsky.

"I didn't think that Davis Guggenheim could make a movie out of a slide show," said Gore, referring to the director of his Academy-Award winning documentary "An Inconvenient Truth," "and after being proved wrong, I would not have been surprised if someone said that Jennifer Baichwal could make a movie out of Edward Burtynsky's photographs, and she has done that and more. It is an extraordinarily haunting, beautiful, insightful, touching and thought-provoking movie."

and after being proved wrong, I would not have been surprised if someone said that Jennifer Baichwal could make a movie out of Edward Burtynsky's photographs, and she has done that and more. It is an extraordinarily haunting, beautiful, insightful, touching and thought-provoking movie.

Burtynsky is internationally acclaimed for his large-scale photographs of "manufactured landscapes" - quarries, recycling yards, factories, mines and dams -- creating stunningly beautiful art from civilization's materials and debris. Baichwal's film follows him through China, as he shoots the evidence and effects of that country's massive industrial revolution. Baichwal's work extends the narratives of Burtynsky's photographs and invites us to meditate on our impact on the planet and witness both the epicenters of industrial endeavor and the dumping grounds of its waste. Zeitgeist Films will release MANUFACTURED LANDSCAPES in cinemas throughout the U. S. in
June.

"This is an incredible honor because Mr. Gore is an inspiration for all of us," said Baichwal, whose work also includes the 2003 NaFF selection "The True Meaning of Pictures: Shelby Lee Adams' Appalachia." "If there is a trend in western civilization toward recognizing how important it is for us to be thinking about our impact on the planet, it is in very, very large part because of him."

The REEL CURRENT award was presented for the third year at the festival, and is given to a documentary screening in NaFF that provides extraordinary insight into a contemporary global issue.

Previous REEL CURRENT award winners were Julie Gustafson for the 2006 NaFF selection "Desire" and Taggart Siegel for the 2005 NaFF selection "The Real Dirt on Farmer John."

Nashville Film Festival continues until April 26, 2007 at the Regal Green Hill Cinema, and closes with the World Premiere Screening of "Americanizing Shelley," starring Beau Bridges and Namrata Singh Gujral, who will both be attending the screening.

Nashville Film Festival is a non-profit 501(c)(3) corporation and receives funding from Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, H. Franklin Brooks Philanthropic Fund, William N. Rollins Fund for the Arts of The Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee, The Frist Foundation, The Memorial Foundation, Nashville Metro Arts Commission, National Endowment for the Arts, Ragsdale Family Foundation, Target Stores, Tennessee Arts Commission, The Cal Turner Family Foundation, and its generous patrons and sponsors.

###

Post Comment:
Trackback URL: http://ca.prweb.com/pingpr.php/TWFnbi1UaGlyLUNvdXAtUHJvZi1NYWduLVplcm8=

al gore photography manufactured landscapes film festival nashville film festival

Bookmark -  Del.icio.us | Digg | Furl It | Spurl | RawSugar | Simpy | Shadows | Blink It | My Web