Something is bad wrong as everyday Americans fight to protect their air, water and blood from pollution. From Ashland’s radioactive oil fields in eastern Kentucky to Bayer’s almost one million pound stockpile of MIC in Institute, West Virginia, you think you know your backyard — but you don’t… Features Bill and Hillary Clinton, Jim Carrey, Morgan Spurlock and more.
Something is BAD wrong when a community is diagnosed with brain tumors at alarming rates. Radiation Safety Officer Wade Smith takes us on a tour of the Martha Oil Fields in eastern Kentucky, land that has been dangerously contaminated with radium 226 because of Ashland Oil’s oil exploration in the area. Includes a fly-over of the KY EPA approved dump site.
TSCA grandfathered over 62,000 chemicals into the American marketplace without ever testing for their health or environmental impact. Get the 411 on the Toxic Substances Control Act from experts at the Environmental Working Group, the Government Accountability Office, the Natural Resources Defense Council and the University of Pittsburgh.
After interviewing United Steel Worker union representative Shawn Gilchrist in Pittsburgh, Shawn managed to get us three tickets inside the 2008 Dupont annual shareholders meeting in Wilmington, Delaware. That’s right, Delaware. Apparently, it does exist and contrary to popular opinion is more than a throwaway joke from “Wayne’s World.” In fact, Dupont has been headquartered in Wilmington for over 300 years and their influence on Delaware state law is unfathomable. Moreover, many of Delaware’s corporate-friendly laws can be credited to Dupont’s steady lobbying over the centuries, laws that have resulted in many of the biggest credit card companies calling Wilmington home.
But back to the documentary. When we got there the United Steel Workers were protesting across the street from the Dupont theater, and the area was crawling with police. The Steel Workers were lobbying for their first pension increase in more than a decade after another quarter of record-breaking profits. Before the meeting started, we interviewed several of the workers who criticized not only Dupont’s treatment of retirees, but also challenged the company’s environmental record.
Rich Kressel, a third generation Duponter from the near-by Chamberworks plant in New Jersey, shared stories of chemical explosions and leaks dating back to when his grandfather had first started working for Dupont almost a hundred years earlier. Rich had recently retired on medical leave after being diagnosed with severe lead poisoning. For years, Dupont produced its lead-based paints at the Chamberworks plant in New Jersey. As a result, the Chamberworks plant earned the nickname the “House of Butterflies” because of the severe hallucinations that workers experienced from their daily exposure to
to the lead-based paints. In any case, when we got inside the Dupont theater later we were blown away. The place is as close to an European palace as any American building I’ve been into. Dare I say that even Ron Burgundy would be impressed with the ballroom’s impressive mahogany wood. But when the meeting began and the floor was finally open for questions, it was time to get down to business. Wasting no time, Jim Cochran dove in, asking Dupont CEO Chad Holliday why C8 was in 96 percent of Americans. Chad didn’t have an answer, however, just an excuse, explaining that there were hundreds of chemicals in people’s bodies already. But the boldest move by Dupont’s CEO came when executive producer Stratton Crace asked Holliday what he planned to do about the chemical contamination in West Virginia. Surprisingly, Holliday acknowledged that Dupont had a lot of work to do in West Virginia and then told Stratton that for specifics they should meet at the end of the Q & A period.
When that time came, however, Holliday skirted out of the back entrance of the auditorium as Stratton, Jimmy and I were distracted by low level PR executives wielding business cards. However, despite repeated attempts to arrange a sit-down interview with Mr. Holliday as suggested, our phone calls and emails went unanswered. Go figure.
Currently, we are submitting “Toxic Soup” to film festivals across the world but we have yet to make our world premiere. As a result, our release date is TBD. This is a pain-staking process so please have patience. When the details are hammered out, you will find out here on our new blog or via our fan pages on twitter and facebook.
Meanwhile, we also applied to Tribeca’sGood Pitch program for additional funds to promote “Toxic Soup” through community outreach projects. Tribeca’s Good Pitch program application date was February 8th.
If you didn’t know already, Dreamworks animator Jason Brubaker completed 10 map animations for the documentary as well as the opening / closing titles. Jason worked on the 2-D opening for “Kung Fu Panda” and has done great work for the documentary. Be sure to check out Jason’s comic blog. He is a talented guy.
Fellow filmmaker Eric Leiser also contributed some cool Tim Burton-esque stop-motion animation to the documentary and we are much obliged to him as well. Look out for Eric’s documentary “Glitch in the Grid” later this year.
In other news, we got a copy of “Toxic Soup” to documentary filmmaker Morgan Spurlock who is a native West Virginian. We managed to get an interview with Morgan at the West Virginia International Film Festival where he was screening his documentary “Where in the world is Osama Bin Laden?” We are hoping that Morgan will provide us with an endorsement to use for our marketing campaign.
Additionally, German journalist Nina Magoley traveled to Paintsville, Kentucky where she met with radiation safety officer Wade Smith as part of an hour long feature story on the radioactivity associated with oil production for WDR, German public radio. An article regarding “Toxic Soup”and Ms. Magoley was featured in the Big Sandy News on January 25th.
In Martha Oil Fields, Red Bush, KY much of the land has been contaminated with Radium 226 as a result of the irresponsible drilling of Ashland Oil. As a consequence, numerous mutant animals have been found in the area, including a 2-headed cat as seen in “Toxic Soup.” Here a local veterinarian shows us a 2-headed pig foetus.
Something is BAD wrong when Radiation Safety Officer Wade Smith takes us on a tour of the Martha Oil Fields in eastern Kentucky, land that has been dangerously contaminated with radium 226 because of Ashland Oil’s oil exploration in the area…
Director Morgan Spurlock (FX “30 Days”, “Super Size Me”) talks about radioactive uranium mines on reservations in New Mexico. We tell him about the Martha Oilfields, a radioactive oil field in eastern Kentucky. We met up with Morgan, a native West Virginian, at a screening his documentary “Where in the World is Osama Bin Laden?” as part of a fundraiser for the West Virginia International Film Festival.
