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1/4
NO IMPACT MAN
2009 / 93 mins
DIRECTORS
Laura Gabbert
Justin Schein
For one year, New Yorker Colin Beavan and his family attempt to live without making any net impact on the environment. In other words, no trash, no carbon emissions, no elevators, no subway, no plastics, no A/C, no TV, no toilets…
Author Colin Beavan and his family were a perfect example of SUV driving, fast food eating New Yorkers who would assuage their guilt with the rest of us at the mall for some good old American retail therapy. Then Colin turned things upside down—he came home and announced that for his next book he would become No Impact Man. For starters that would mean no trash, no electricity, no cars, no toilet paper, no TV, and no buying anything new for an entire year. The hitch was that he wanted his wife and their two-year-old daughter Isabella to join him for this year-long experiment.
NO IMPACT MAN presents an intimate emotional portrait of a couple struggling through a severe and protracted change in their way of life. The filmmakers document what happens to a couple's emotional life when they alter their entire lifestyle over the course of a year. How do they cope with the constant stress and intermittent crises of such a rigorous way of living? Or, perhaps, when life is pared down, do some things become unexpectedly better and even easier?
PRESS
“Proof that 'eco' and 'entertainment' aren’t mutually exclusive, No Impact Man may be a socially progressive, environmentally conscious film, but it goes down far easier than, say, an all-natural, fiber-enriched peanut butter sandwich without a glass of soy milk. It’s that rare doc (these days) that could go theatrical, largely because it’s a film about a couple, more than a movement. In fact, at the risk of causing domestic discord, this film might have been called 'No Impact Woman.'"
– Variety
"Gabbert and Schein have done an impressive job at documenting the No Impact project.”
– Film Threat
"You'll appreciate and enjoy the Beavans' struggles from the cloth diapers to the traditional refrigerator that wasn't meant to be, and, perhaps, be moved to embrace similar changes. That's an impact Beavan would be happy to leave."
– Creative Threat
"Walking out of directors Laura Gabbert and Justin Schein's terrifically entertaining new documentary, NO IMPACT MAN, which followed writer Colin Beavan and his family as they sought to transform their lives into ones that would have no harmful ecological impact on the world, I felt energized - if we all just did a little, imagine..."
– LA Times
"A bold and astonishing documentary about the daunting and enlightening ecological project of a radical idealist and his New York City family."
– Spirituality and Practice
SELECT FESTIVALS
Sundance 2009
Los Angeles Film Festival 2009
Silverdocs Film Festival 2009
DOCVILLE 2010
Seoul International Eco Film Festival 2010
DocuDays Ukraine 2010
WHERE TO WATCH
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