Story by Yawen Chen
Bijou Art Cinemas was packed this past Thursday night for special premiere screenings of If a Tree Falls: A Story of the Earth Liberation Front and a following Q&A Skype session with the film’s director, Marshall Curry.
As a hot spot for a series of Earth Liberation Front (ELF) radical movements during the tumultuous period from 1995 until early 2001, Eugenians at the Bijou showed support for ELF’s efforts of raising environmental awareness by frequent applauding during the film screenings. Combined with intimate interviews with ELF members, the prosecutor, and detective who were chasing them, the film reveals how ELF, a group that the FBI has called America’s “number one domestic terrorism threat” came into being and gradually developed until ELF quickly seized national attention. McGowan’s arrest led to the organization’s final crackdown. The striking archival footage displayed several fierce conflicts in the past between the protestors and cops in Eugene.
During the Q&A session, Marshall Curry talked about how his wife, a co-worker of Daniel McGowan’s, inspired him to create such a documentary. As for the controversies around the ELF, Curry avoided taking sides as he presents interviews from both the ELF members and the prosecutor and detective who were chasing them. On the other hand, the audience was eager to know how his film impacted on limiting the environmental destructions by timber companies, while Curry preferred to see the film as an opportunity to present the past than to be an aggressive advocate for either side.
The film is chosen to be the first event in Bijou’s new monthly series, The Cinema Pacific Filmmaker Dialogues. “I’m very glad to see such a good turn-out and hope more people in Eugene can come see it and think about it,” Curry said at the end of the Skype session.