Gasland (2010)

When I used to think of Natural Gas, I thought: clean and simple.  It's natural like tapping into a volcano.  How naive was I?  Josh Fox, the director of this moving and informative film, just smashed my preconceived ideas into a billion bits (sort of like fracking my mind of disinformation).  [Battlestar Galatica nerds out there, fracking here does not mean what you think.]  Watching this documentary I couldn't help but blink with recognition; I know these people.  The families effected by this blooming disaster remind me of neighbors I know.  These aren't eccentric celebrities or faraway foreigners, but down-to-Earth Americans being hurt by greedy corporations.  I know this idea of "big greedy corporations" has become kind of trite but how else can you describe it: some very rich people are doing whatever they can to guarantee they continue to make money.  Or said another way: they care more for their profits than for future generations of this country (from some reason the image of Dick Cheney popped into my head).  What you need to know is this: natural gas companies have zero government regulations (because they're exempt from all our laws that exist to protect the environment) on their practice of Hydraulic fracturing, where basically they pump into the ground a cocktail of bad chemicals to break up oil and gas wells to collect what we call National Gas.  These bad chemicals then make it into neighboring water supplies.  Then guess what happens?  People get sick.  Animals lose their fur.   Wells explode!  And nothing is being done about it!   This is a very important documentary that should be seen by everyone in the country.  I say this a lot to people when I watch a really great documentary but if there ever was a time to believe me it is now.   When people can light their tap water on fire, that should grab your attention.   As for the film making, Mr. Fox delivers a fantastic blend of information and story that never lets up.  There are some moments where I felt my skin tingle when his passion for nature illuminates the screen.  Grade: A.

I also implore you to check out the film's website.   There's a great part where Mr. Fox rebuttals claims by the Energy in Depth website that attempts to debunk the film.  And let's hope the FRAC Act someday gets passed in Congress.  If the BP oil spill taught us anything is that we should never let these companies have free rein of our land.