SLOW FOOD CINEMA: Recent documentary films compiled by Stephen Nottingham

Film	length	year	description	credits
A Year in Burgundy	1 h 31 m	2013	Seven families discuss the cultural and creative process of making wine in the Burgundy region of France.	Dir: David Kennard
Addicted to Sheep	1 h 26 m	2015	UK: In North Pennines, tenant farmers Tom & Kay look after a flock of prized sheep. This film follows them on the farm for a year.	Dir: Magali Pettier
Bananas*	1 h 20 m	2009	Sweden: The effects (death, infertility) of Dole’s use of a banned chemical on workers in banana plantations in Nicaragua.	Dir. Fredrik Gertten
Big Boys Gone Bananas	1 h 30 m	2011	Sweden/Germany/UK/USA/Denmark: In 2009 Dole Food Company campaigned to prevent the screening of ‘Bananas’ at Los Angeles film festival. Three years later, the director comes back with another eye-opening documentary examining the right to freedom of speech and the story of what happens when filmmakers go up against a large corporation like Dole.	Dir. Fredrik Gertten
Can You Dig This	1 h 20 m	2015	USA: South Los Angeles. As part of an urban gardening movement taking root in South LA, people are planting to transform their neighbourhoods. This film follows the inspirational journeys of four unlikely gardeners, discovering what happens when they put their hands in the soil. The film features inspirational guerrilla gardener Ron Finley.	Dir. Delila Vallot
Discovering Lindane: the legacy of HCH production	33 m	2015	Spain: The legacy of Lindane production in northern Spain, and a project demonstrating how to clean up pesticide contamination here and in similar situations.	Film by Arturo Hortas
Edible City: A documentary about the good food movement	55 m	2014	USA: “fun, fast-paced journey through the local Good Food Movement taking root in the San Francisco Bay Area, and around the world. Introducing a diverse cast of extraordinary and eccentric characters who are challenging the paradigm of our broken food system, EDIBLE CITY digs into their unique perspectives and transformative work—from edible education to grassroots activism to building local economies…”	Dir: Andrew Hasse
El Bulli: Cooking in Progress	1 h 48 m	2010	Germany: For 6 months of the year, Spanish chef Ferran Adrià and his team used to close El Bulli to prepare the innovative menu for the next season. An elegant, detailed study of food as avant-garde art.	Dir: Gereon Wetzel
Farmageddon: The unseen war on American family farms	1 h 26 m	2011	USA: The story of a mom whose son healed from all allergies and asthma after consuming raw milk and real food from farms. It shows people all over US forming food co-ops and private clubs to get these foods, and how they were raided by state and local governments.	Dir: Kristin Canty
Fed Up	1 h 32 m	2014	USA: A look at the causes of obesity epidemic and the food industry's role in aggravating it.	Film by Stephanie Soechtig & Katie Couric
Fish Meat	29 & 52 m	2012	USA/Turkey: As our hunger for seafood grows, the seas are running out of fish. But what exactly is farmed fish? Two friends, a fish scientist and environmental engineer, take a sailing voyage to pull back the cover on modern fish farming. Along the way they discover the tragedy of Bluefin Tuna and the joy of carp.	Dir: Joe Cunningham Writer: Ted Caplow
Food, inc	1 h 34 m	2008	USA: An unflattering look inside America's corporate controlled food industry. Contributors include Michael Pollan, Eric Schlosser and Richard Lobb.	Dir: Robert Kenner
Grazers: A Cooperative Story	69 m	2014	USA: With increasing interest in farm-to-table food, a small group of upstate New York farmers sees an opportunity to hold on to their endangered farms by raising and selling grass-fed beef. The film follows the cooperatives efforts for two years, exposing the difficulties facing small-scale farming in our modern, industrial world.	Film by Sarah Teale & Lisa F Jackson
Good Things Await	90 m	2014	Denmark/USA (subtitled): Farmer Niels Stokholm and his wife Rita work the biodynamic farm in Thorshøjgaardalternative, Denmark, with natural livestock rearing and other alternative methods, and they supply top restaurants (e.g. NOMA), but in conflict with national organic standards body.	Dir. Phie Ambo
Growing Cities	1 h 37 m	2013	USA: A film examining the role of urban farming in America, asking how much power it has to revitalize our cities and change the way we eat.	Dir: Daniel Susman, co-writer Andrew Monbouquette
Hungry for Change	1 h 29 m	2012	Exposes ‘secrets’ of diet and weight loss - deceptive food industries strategies designed to keep you coming back for more.	Dir: James Colquhoun & Laurentine Ten Bosch
Ingredients: The Local Food Movement takes Root	1 h 13 m	2009	USA: American food is crisis: obesity and diabetes, family farms in decline and environment in jeopardy. The film explores a local food movement, seeking more flavour and nutrition to bring good food back to the table and health back to communities. Contributions from Alice Waters and several restaurateurs.	Dir: Robert Bates
Just Eat It: A Food Waste Story	75 m	2014	USA/UK (focus on USA). Filmmakers and food lovers Jen & Grant look at the issue of food waste, from farm to fridge. After catching a glimpse of billions of dollars of good food tossed away each year in North America, they pledge to survive only on discarded food.	Dir: Grant Baldwin
Local Food Roots	35 m	2014	UK: The emergence of innovative local food movement from a handful of pioneers in the early 90s to diverse UK-wide movement; first organic box schemes to today’s local food culture.	f3/Sprout Films Joy Carey co-producer & scriptwriter
Moo Man	97 m	2013	UK: Filmed over 4 years on marshes of the Pevensey Levels, maverick farmer Stephen Hook turns his back on cost-cutting dairies and supermarkets, and instead stays small and family-run to keep a close relationship with his herd of cows.	Dir: Andy Heathcote
More than Honey	92 m	2013	Switzerland/Germany/Austria: Delightful, informative & suitably contemplative study of the bee world. State-of-the-art film making (with surprisingly up-closes) looks at why bee populations worldwide are collapsing. English version narrated by John Hurt.	Film by Markus Imhoof
Noma: My Perfect Storm	1 h 40 m	2015	Focus on chef and Noma co-owner René Redzepi’s work, as he searches for inspiration in Denmark and reflects on the Copenhagen restaurant’s success. The restaurant helped bring Scandinavian food to the world’s attention. The films looks at foraging and local food sourcing.	Dir: Pierre Deschamps
Open Sesame: The Story of Seeds	82 m	2014	Protecting endangered seed varieties (90% of fruit & veg varieties existing 100 years ago are gone. Maintaining remaining seed biodiversity essential to breed new varieties resistant to pests or that will thrive in temperature extremes and a changing climate.	Film by Sean Kaminsky
Raising Shrimp	52 m	2013	USA: Shrimp is the most popular seafood in the USA, but 90% is imported and most of that is farmed. How is shrimp farmed? Is it safe to eat? What happened to the American shrimp fishery?  Among questions asked.	Film by Joe Cunningham  & Ted Caplow
Slow Food Story	1 h 14 m	2013	Italy/Ireland: In 1986, Carlo Petrini founded the ArciGola Gastronomic Association in Italy and 3 years later launched Slow Food, an international anti-fast-food resistance movement. From the tiny town of Bra, home to some 27,000 inhabitants, the Slow Food movement has grown to become a revolution that now has roots in more than 150 countries. Cheese-makers, vintners, and artisanal food folk, toast Slow Food for bringing about a change in consciousness that shook the very foundation of gastronomy. Featuring Carlo Petrini and narrated by Azio Citi.	Dir: Stefano Sardo
Slow Food Videos	1 m – 20 min		Range of Slow Food videos on all aspects of Slow Food’s campaigns.
Seeds of Time	77 m	2013	USA: The story of Cary Fowler's drive to collect seeds and create a seed bank to preserve agricultural biodiversity - the Svalbard Global Seed Vault on the arctic island of Spitsbergen, Norway.	Dir: Sandy McLeod
Symphony of the Soil	103 m	2012	USA: An artistic exploration of soil. By understanding elaborate relationships and mutuality between soil, water, atmosphere, plants and animals, we come to appreciate the complex & dynamic nature of this precious resource. Includes use/misuse of soil in agriculture etc worldwide and soil’s key role in ameliorating the most challenging environmental issues of our time.	A film by Deborah Koons Garcia
The Clean Bin Project	76 m	2011	USA: Is it possible to live completely waste free? Partners Jen & Grant go head to head in a competition to swear off consumerism and produce the least garbage [focus on packaging/ecological impacts]	Dir: Grant Baldwin
The Farmer and The Horse	1 h 17 m	2010	USA: Film about sustainability, self-sufficiency, and why we do the work we do. Difficulties and satisfaction of organic farming, through one New Jersey farmer’s experience (doesn’t use a tractor). Concerns land use, the environment, and good food.	Film by Jared Flesher
The Last Catch (15)	85& 52 m	2012	Germany: Fish stocks facing collapse. Focus on Bluefin tuna. Modern big business, traditional family fishing business and industry critic POVs.	Dir: Markus Schmidt
This Changes Everything	89 m	2015	USA/Canada. Filmed in 9 countries/5 continents over 4 years, this documentary looks at the vast challenge of climate change. Inspired by Naomi Klein's bestseller.	Dir: Avi Lewis

Nightingale Community Garden joins National Gardens Scheme

Nightingale Community Garden in Dinas Powys is opening for the first time as part of the National Gardens Scheme (NGS), over the weekend of Saturday 2 and Sunday 3 July 2016. It will join seven other Dinas Powys gardens, some of them veterans of the scheme that sees gardens opening to the public and raising money for charity. One of the local charities that benefits is Dinas Powys Voluntary Concern.

As with the private gardens in the Dinas Powys gardens group, the Community Garden will be open from 11am to 6pm over the weekend. The gardens can be visited for a combined admission price of £5.00, with children free. You’ll find home-made teas/cakes and plant sales in some of the gardens. The Community Garden will have volunteers and plot-holders around all weekend to answer questions. I’ll report here nearer the time on planned activities in the garden.

From the NGS brochure:
“Nightingale Community Garden, Sir Ivor Place, Dinas Powys, CF64 4QZ
Three years ago the gardens were created on an old derelict playground with funding from Tidy Town Wales. 27 Gardens were created including 2 raised beds for the physically handicapped. Many local residents, young and old, grow a variety of vegetables, fruit and flowers. The excess is donated weekly to the local Food Bank. In addition we have 2 Greenhouses and a communal area for activities.
How to find us: Along pathway between Sir Ivor Place & Nightingale Place. At T-lights on Cardiff Rd, turn R by school if driving from Barry, or L if driving from Cardiff/Penarth. Continue, then take 2nd R at Camm's Corner. You may park here.”

For further information, including details of the other gardens, visit the Dinas Powys Group Gardens page on the National Gardens Scheme website:
http://www.ngs.org.uk/gardens/find-a-garden/Garden.aspx?id=30309

Timeline for Nightingale Community Garden, Dinas Powys:
Jan 2012
http://sfnottingham.blogspot.com/2012/01/creating-community-garden.html
The initial idea and looking for funding

Feb 2012
http://sfnottingham.blogspot.co.uk/2012/02/creating-community-garden-2.html
The involvement of Creative Rural Communities and the first plan for the site

Aug 2012
http://sfnottingham.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/creating-community-garden-3.html

Oct 2012
http://sfnottingham.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/creating-community-garden-4.html
Funding in place and residents are briefed on progress

Jan 2013
http://sfnottingham.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/creating-community-garden-5.html
Work starts clearing the ground

Feb 2013
http://sfnottingham.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/creating-community-garden-6.html
Building contractors on site

March 2013
http://sfnottingham.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/creating-community-garden-7.html
Topsoil is spread and the first garden visit occurs

April 2013
http://sfnottingham.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/creating-community-garden-8.html
The plots are marked out and allocated, the first plants go in

June 2013
http://sfnottingham.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/creating-community-garden-9.html
Photos of the garden flourishing in its first year

Sept 2013
http://sfnottingham.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/creating-community-garden-10.html
The official opening of the community garden, with guests including Jane Hutt AM and Derek Brockway

May 2014
http://sfnottingham.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/creating-community-garden-11.html
Progress report a year after opening – a highly productive local food growing area

July 2014
http://sfnottingham.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/nightingale-community-garden-links-up.html
The Community Garden links up with the local food bank – to supply fresh food to supplement the basic food bank boxes

July 2015
http://sfnottingham.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/the-two-year-old-community-garden-and.html
One of the Community Garden’s youngest gardeners, Dan Tailby (age 6) who grew his first plants in the communal family plot in the garden, is a finalist in the 2015 Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) Young Gardener of the Year Awards

Cardiff Urban Buzz

The charity Buglife launched ‘Cardiff Urban Buzz’ at the Chapter Arts Centre on 24 Nov 2015. Cardiff is one of eight cities across the UK that will receive funding over a total of three years (18 months each) within the Urban Buzz project, which aims to benefit both pollinators and people. Funded by a Biffa Award (from landfill tax), the Heritage Lottery Fund, the Garfield Weston Foundation and other organisations, depending on location, Urban Buzz will create pollinator habitats, such as wildflower meadows, and engage with a diverse range of people, groups and organisations. The project will provide volunteers with training and experience in the field of habitat creation, habitat assessment, and conservation practice.

Clare Dunham of Buglife welcomed us all to the launch event. She put the initiative into context, for example, its contribution to the Welsh Assembly Government’s Action Plan for Pollinators.

Urban Buzz is one of two projects involving Buglife that aim to benefit pollinating insects (mainly bees, but also other invertebrates such as butterflies, moths and beetles). The other project is B-lines, in which a network of wildflower-rich grassland corridors is being established through the countryside. This is a good example of landscape-scale conservation (see link below), and provides the ecological corridors linking biodiversity that are vital as habitats increasingly fragment and the climate changes. Such a system of B-lines is being planned for South Wales, along the lines of B-lines already created in the West of England as a result of a collaboration between Buglife and Avon Wildlife Trust.

At the Urban Buzz launch, Councillor Bob Derbyshire (Rumney, Cardiff) outlined the importance to Cardiff of the project, which will establish partnerships to enhance parks and gardens for wildlife in the city.

Michelle Bales of Buglife then reminded us of the importance of pollinators and provided more detail about Cardiff Urban Buzz. Urban areas provide an important refuge for pollinators, particularly bees, which are declining in the countryside due to loss of natural habitats, intensive farming practices and the use of pesticides. The decline in the total number and the number of species of bumblebees, honeybees and other pollinators are genuinely alarming, especially given that they are vital for the pollination of many food crops and a large amount of our native flora. One in every three mouthfuls of food, accordingly to statistics presented here, contains a food crop pollinated by insects.

In Cardiff, a local steering group will direct the Cardiff Urban Buzz actions; the group will include Buglife, Cardiff Council, the local Wildlife Trust, the National Museum Wales in Cardiff, Keep Wales Tidy and a range of local community groups. The project aims to create habitats for pollinators in partnership with local organisations. The overall goal is to create 100 habitat areas in the eight cities (25 ha per city), on both the small and large scale. This will include wildflower meadows, green walls, bee hotels, and other appropriate foraging and nesting sites for pollinator species. Engaging with a diverse range of people and organisations, to raise awareness and to get as many volunteers on board as possible, is an essential part of the project. Volunteers will be able to learn new practical skills through training workshops in habitat creation, habitat assessment, identification and monitoring. The project will provide tools and resources for habitat creation, and the capacity that will enable these local initiatives to carry on after the 18 months of the Cardiff Urban Buzz project.

Michelle pointed us in the direction of the project website – www.buglife.org.uk/urban-buzz/cardiff - where people can suggest sites for pollinator habitat creation or enhancement. These sites already include parks, Cathays Cemetery, river and lakeside areas, and allotments. Further along the line, there will be a public voting system to prioritise lines of action. This all helps create the sense of ownership necessary for the longevity of the project actions.

The next stage will be volunteer recruitment and the selection of sites, so visit the website or contact Michelle Bales (michelle.bales@buglife.org.uk) if you are interested or know a good as yet unsuggested site.

Julie Hughes, representing the Heritage Lottery Fund, gave the final short presentation. In south Wales, the Heritage Lottery Fund has funded numerous natural heritage projects, including two high profile projects: the Living Levels to promote conservation in the Gwent Levels and the Forgotten Landscape Partnership Project focused on the Blaenavon World Heritage Site (the wildlife value of coal spoil tips and brownfield sites are now starting to be recognised). The selection criteria focuses on what people consider important, and what will provide benefits to both nature and people. So far the Cardiff-based Heritage Lottery Fund Wales has distributed around £320 million to around 2,300 projects of widely-ranging sizes in Wales.

Selected previous posts on pollinators on this blog:

http://sfnottingham.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/nectar-point-networks.html

http://sfnottingham.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/nectar-point-networks-2.html

A news story I did on the ‘The Future of Landscape-scale Conservation in Europe’ meeting in Bristol (4-5 March 2015) for the EC LIFE Programme website:
http://ec.europa.eu/environment/life/news/newsarchive2015/march/index.htm#landscape-scale

See also:
http://www.buglife.org.uk
http://www.hlf.org.uk
http://bumblebeeconservation.org

In the archive at St Fagans National History Museum

Members of the Slow Food South East Wales Committee visited the archive at the St Fagans National History Museum this week, to look at the wealth of food and drink related material in the collection. We plan to make use of this material in upcoming Slow Food South East Wales events, for example, to give historical context to planned meetings that focus on particular topics, such as beekeeping or Welsh lamb.

The material in the archive includes films and photographs, index cards with recipes, taped audio interviews, and letters sent by the public describing their typical daily diet in the early 1960s. It all amounts to an invaluable resource, detailing knowledge of local food culture that is in danger of being lost.

Many of the films in the archive were given by BBC Wales and the commercial channel TWW (Television Wales and the West), at a time when these broadcasters did not usually keep their own documentary footage on tape. We watched a film about cider making in Monmouth in the 1960s; a film showing cockle harvesting on Llanrhidian Marsh, the cleaning and cooking process, and their journey to Swansea Market; and two that were filmed in one of the farmhouses on the St Fagans site that represent the only visual record of the preparation of traditional cake recipes.

The majority of the food-related material in the archive relates to the work of S. Minwel Tibbot at the National History Museum, who travelled throughout Wales in the 1970s interviewing the older generation of woman about their food memories. We listening to some of the tape recordings of interviews conducted by S. Minwel Tibbot, in which she obtained detailed information about traditional dishes. This information informed her classic books, including ‘Welsh Fare’ and ‘Geirfa'r gegin’. In one sound recording, conducted by S. Minwel Tibbott in 1971, Mrs Griffiths of Gwaelod-y-Garth describes how she made and sold two types of toffee (white and brown) from her home in Pentyrch at the beginning of the 20th century. In another recording, with Mrs Rogers in 1972, we hear about family recipes for peas pudding, parsley pie, Aunt Martha’s pudding, Granny’s pudding, nettle pop and mead.

The image library has a room of its own, with slides and photos mounted on card arranged by theme in filing cabinets. The archive has also amassed a large recipe collection, obtained through questionnaires, letters and handwritten recipes passed down through the generations. At this year’s St Fagans Food Festival in September, visitors were asked to contribute to this collection, by sharing their family recipes.

Look out for some of this material in the new galleries at St Fagans National History Museum, when they open after redevelopment, and at upcoming Slow Food South East Wales events.


Slow Food South East Wales currently has a stall at the Riverside Farmers’ Market in Cardiff (Sundays 10am-2pm), with a cook book swap and recipe advice.

To celebrate Slow Food’s Terra Madre Day on 10 December, Slow Food South East Wales will be holding an event in collaboration with the Italian Cultural Group, with a focus on honey and beekeeping.

In the spring, Slow Food South East Wales will be holding an event on a farm, where Welsh lamb takes centre stage.

I will forward on further info in a future blog post. In the meantime, you could follow @SlowFoodSEWales on Twitter.

Previous posts concerning Slow Food on this blog:

Slow Food South East Wales launches at St Fagans

http://sfnottingham.blogspot.co.uk/2015/06/slow-food-south-east-wales-launches-at.html

Welsh products in the Ark of Taste

http://sfnottingham.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/welsh-products-in-ark-of-taste.html

Bringing Slow Food to South East Wales

http://sfnottingham.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/welsh-products-in-ark-of-taste.html

More on the St Fagans archives:

http://www.museumwales.ac.uk/curatorial/social-cultural-history/archives/

More on the extension at St Fagans:

http://www.museumwales.ac.uk/stfagans/makinghistory/