H2Oil

(Canada, 2009, 81 mins, HDCAM)

PRODS: Sergeo Kirby, Sarah Spring
SCR: Shannon Walsh
CAM: Alan Kohl
EDS: Sophie Leblond, Étienne Gagnon
MUS: Rebecca Foon, Ian Ilavsky, Eric Craven

Whether it's the Niger Delta (Sweet Crude), the Amazon rainforest (Crude) or Northern Alberta, (H2Oil), the story of oil remains the same. But in Canada, the tar sands development has created an environmental nightmare on a gargantuan scale. Giant tailing ponds (visible from space) contain approximately 1.8 billion litres of toxic runoff, a carcinogenic soup thick with heavy metals, arsenic and naphthalenic acids. Downstream on the Athabasca River in Fort Chipewyan, clusters of rare cancers in the local population indicate that the level of toxicity in the land, air and water is reaching dangerous levels. We understand on one level that our dependence on oil is near suicidal, but how much do we know--or do--about what is happening in our own country? Shannon Walsh's stunning documentary demonstrates that oil and water are not only mutually incompatible, but that we eventually have to choose one over the other. How much damage will we let happen in the meantime?

"This is a personal film and it is a political film. It is story about real people, not abstract impacts. It is a visual story built on the sounds and the images that are quickly diminishing in Alberta. It is not with nostalgia, but with hope, that we will attempt to make this place, and the people within it, come alive."--Shannon Walsh

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