Lake County News | California

Second Sunday Cinema’s Free Film for July 11 is “Collapse”

Second Sunday Cinema’s free film for July 11 is Michael Ruppert’s just-released DVD, “Collapse”.  As you can tell from the title, Ruppert is no Pollyanna.  In fact, he’s been called “Apocalyptic”.  But don’t mistake him for an “End of the World” loony.  This is the former LAPD cop who, in his “outsider” self-published newspaper, “From the Wilderness”, predicted our on-going financial crisis back in 2006 when Washington, Wall Street and corporate media were either ignorant, in denial or actively working to hide what was coming down the pike.   And all of his facts (not theories) are readily available to the public --  but who has the time to put it all together?   Mike Ruppert did.

Director Chris Smith is well known for his “outsider” films, “American Movie” and “The Yes Men”.  Those had the feel of cinema verite.  But as Chris Smith explains about ”Collapse”, “We wanted the film to feel like an interrogation, that you’re stuck in an unknown location getting let in on secret information.  It was all an attempt to get the audience inside Michael’s head.”  And this riveting, engaging film succeeds mightily.  SSC coordinators Shannon and Jim, who have seen too many similar films to count, were electrified.

Ruppert is sometimes absolutist in his interpretation of fact.  While he claims that all bio-fuels are net energy negative,, for example, some scientists claim some of them to be potentially quite net-positive.  But this film is a wake-up call on “Peak Everything” and what Ruppert sees as the not-too-far-off collapse of western industrial civilization, when cheap oil is no longer available to fuel our life styles.  Why not see it and make up your own mind, as the director intended?

As a wonderful and inspiring extra, Nils Palsson will talk about Transition Towns following the film.  Nils, a very positive young man and relative newcomer to Lake Co, just got back from the US Social Forum, a grass-roots movement and gathering that attracted 20.000 people to Detroit for two weeks in late June.  Transition Towns were being discussed a lot, and Nils will be sharing what he learned.  SSC intends to be part of a local movement to estrablish TTs here in Lake Co.

To balance the bracing tone of this film, we’ll also be showing a short piece of “One Giant Leap”, a musical documentary interweaving gorgeous music from around the world to show that we all are, in essence, one.

As always, the film will screen at the Clearlake United Methodist Church at 14521 Pearl Ave near Mullen in Clearlake.  More info at 279-2957