Under the Green Sun

Each day in New York alone, tons of food gets thrown away. A growing group of Westerners is now looking for small-scale solutions to the waste that results from consumer culture. We get to know a couple of "freegans," who dig through trash bags looking for food. These dumpster-divers come from all walks of life. They have no problem affording fresh food, but simply cannot condone overproduction. In the words of one freegan, "this salmon came a long way from Chile to be thrown away in an American dumpster!" Director Chantal Lasbats meets idealists who consciously choose for moderation, just like the people behind the Foods Not Bombs program, which prepares meals for the poor from food found on the street. Growing one's own food is also very in: people grow vegetables on rooftops and undeveloped urban parcels and in eco-villages, where small communities are self-sufficient. Lasbats visits these inspiring places and discusses the rise of the movement with her subjects. We meet environmental advisor and lawyer James Gustave Speth, who argues that we will indeed have to start living differently, in these times of economic crises, rising oil prices and food shortages. The green warriors would seem to be working on a utopia, but given the mess we're in now, that's not completely accurate. In Speth's opinion, "The real utopian fantasy is the idea that we can just keep going like we are now."