movies
BY CAMILLA MORTENSEN
Activism on Fire
ELF documentary asks just what is a terrorist
IF A TREE FALLS: A STORY OF THE
EARTH LIBERATION FRONT Directed and
produced by Marshall Curry. Codirected and
produced by Sam Cullman. Cinematography by
Sam Cullman. Written and edited by Matthew
Hamacheck and Marshall Curry. Music by
James Baxter. Featuring Kirk Engdall, Jim
Flynn, Tim Lewis, Daniel McGowan, Lauren
Regan.
Y
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FROM ACADEMY AWARD ® NOMINATED FILMMAKER
MARSHALL CURRY
“THIS SUMMER’S MOST URGENT
DOCUMENTARY.”
– OUTSIDE MAGAZINE
“HAS TO BE SEEN TO BE BELIEVED.”
– VARIETY
CRITICS’ PICK
NEW YORK MAGAZINE
EXCLUSIVE ENGAGEMENT
STARTS THURSDAY, JUNE 23
BIJOU ART CINEMA
Eugene (541) 686-2458
ou don’t expect a documentary
about the Earth Liberation Front
(ELF) in Oregon to open on the
streets of New York City. But If a Tree
Falls cuts from dramatic media footage,
including the burning of a $12 million
ski resort at Vail, Colo., to the streets of
New York, where activist and ecosaboteur
Daniel McGowan was living in 2005. He
was arrested in December of that year
for his role in the ELF arsons that hit the
Northwest from 1996 to 2001. The fi lm
quietly makes its point that McGowan
traveled a long way, physically and
philosophically, from NYC to Oregon and
arson and back again.
Filmmaker Marshall Curry learned
of McGowan’s case the day of the arrest
— McGowan worked for Curry’s wife
at Womenslaw.org — and he says one
of the things that drew him to making
If a Tree Falls was “something in the
contradiction”: McGowan, the son of a
NYC cop and a business major in college,
didn’t fi t the stereotype of an ecoterrorist.
In making the fi lm, he says, “people defi ed
my expectations again and again.”
One of the challenges of the fi lm, Curry
says, was condensing a story that “would
take up a Ken Burns 10-part series” to 85
minutes. Focusing on McGowan allows
the fi lm to go deeply into one person’s
decisions in the context of a larger
movement.
If a Tree Falls is not an “activist fi lm”
per se. It gives an equal amount of time to
the voices of McGowan and Eugene’s own
Tim Lewis, Jim Flynn and Civil Liberties
Defense Center attorney Lauren Regan
as it does to prosecutor Kirk Engdall and
Eugene police detective Greg Harvey.
If a Tree Falls allows those prosecuting
McGowan as a terrorist to be human, too.
Engdall, in an interview in the
documentary, says of his work on the case:
“You see all the damage and the harm they
did, the threats they made and they are not
very likable people at all … but you gain
an understanding and an insight how it
came to pass that they started doing these
things and then you’re curious about how
their lives will end up. But only time will
tell.”
THURS 6/23: 6:15 & 8:45 PM
FRI, MON-THURS: 5:30 7:45 9:45 PM
SAT & SUN: 3:30 5:30 7:45 9:45 PM
“It’s not the fi lm I would have made,”
says Lewis, whose own documentary
footage appears in the fi lm, “but he (Curry)
did a good job telling the story.” Lewis
says he hopes the fi lm brings the issues
of police brutality toward protesters and
questioning who is called a terrorist to a
new audience. Going through his own
video footage of forest protests and the
local activist scene was one catalyst for the
videographer to start posting some of the
vignettes he’s fi lmed over the years on his
YouTube site, PictureEugene, Lewis says.
The fi lm’s clear-eyed take on the
dramatic events that catalyzed the local
ELF movement — from the Eugene
downtown pepper-spray incident to the
WTO protests — as well as the words of
those on the opposite end of the spectrum
such as Engdall, lets viewers make their
own decisions — or indecisions — about
the environmental and social issues that
led up to the arsons. Bill Barton of the
Native Forest Council asks, while gazing
out over a stark Oregon clearcut, “Why are
we so gentle in our activism when this is
what’s happening?”
Curry says, “Daniel looking at theses
fi res, looking at these years of his life,
is very confl icted.” With scenes from
McGowan’s family and candid interviews
with McGowan himself — talking to fellow
ecosaboteur Jake Ferguson while Ferguson
was wearing on FBI wire, deciding whether
to cooperate with the federal prosecutors
and fi nally reporting to federal prison —
the fi lm permits McGowan’s character,
confl icts and all, to drive it.
The documentary draws on archival
footage, and shots by Lewis from Warner
Creek and other local protests lend a feeling
of an insider’s view to a time and a group of
people that for many is hard to understand.
The fi lm premiered at the Sundance
Film Festival in January. Lewis says he
was later told FBI agents were at the fi rst
screening.
It’s “a story of the Earth Liberation
Front,” says Curry, “not the story.” The
strength of the fi lm is that it steps aside and
lets the images and the people involved
— those like Steven Swanson of Superior
Lumber, whose buildings were burned,
and McGowan himself, who participated
in the burning — tell that story.
ew
If a Tree Falls was an offi cial selection of the 2011
Sundance Film Festival and winner of the festival’s
Documentary Editing Award. The fi lm screens
Thursday, June 23 at 6:15 and 8:45 pm at Bijou Art
Cinemas as part of the new monthly Cinema Pacifi ca
Filmmaker Dialogues. These premiere screenings will
be followed by a moderated Skype chat with director
Marshall Curry.
WE’VE GOT YOUR DOG!
FILMMAKER Q&A S VIA SKYPE ON THURSDAY, JUNE 23 FOLLOWING 6:15PM AND 8:45PM SHOWS.
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