Coming to PBS’s America ReFramed tonight, Tuesday, April 12: REVERSING THE MISSISSIPPI
Ian Midgley’s look at the meeting of two innovators made its debut at the New Orleans Film Festival this past Fall. The film has also screened at Austria’s Crossroads, UnionDocs, and Palm Springs’ American Doc fests.
Marcin Jakubowski has a disruptive idea: His Open Source Ecology has developed blueprints for farm equipment and has made them free for anyone to use to build their own. In this way, he hopes to help individuals interested in sustainability bypass the high financial bar for entry into farming, and he’s attracted a cadre of volunteers to the Factor E Farm in Missouri to assist the development of his plan. Meanwhile, in New Orleans, Nat Turner, a former NYC school teacher, relocated to the Lower 9th Ward after Katrina to open Our School at Blair Grocery, a community center that serves a sanctuary to youth, empowering them to grow and sell their own vegetables. Both men are beset by problems as they try in their own way to change the world – Jakubowski’s lack of interpersonal skills leads to a disgruntled team that threatens to abandon his dream, while Turner struggles with a lack of financial and technological resources to keep his endeavor in operation. When these two men meet, they see the potential that that their collaboration can be stronger than their individual efforts. Enabling their intersection, Midgely offers an intimate look at the highs and lows that result as they attempt the seemingly impossible.
what (not) to doc 