[MattSavinar]

Well folks, I saw it. To be honest with you, I was mostly concerned with how I came off. (Wouldn't you if it was you?) It looked like I was in a bunker, but I sounded like I had some relatively decent idea of what I was talking about it and I was identified as an attorney. I think this contrast may have confused the crowd. On the one hand, you half expect them to pan around the room and see a stack of AR-15s and ammo but I sound as domesticated and academic as I actually am in real life. (Truth be told, I'd be owned by a testy squirrel in the backyard if push came to shove.)

As far as the rest of the movie: the one thing that stood out for me when trying to put myself in the shoes of somebody who is new to this is all the people who appear in the film are the FURTHEST thing from the usual alarmist, Berkely-archetypes that end up in films warning us about how fucked we are for destroying the "Mother Goddess", or something along those lines.

Case in point: they have an interview with this Texas oil guy, about 80 years old, drawl as thick as you can imagine, driving his beat up truck out to some oil fields. If you were to look up "texas oil man" in the dictionary, his picture would be there. He starts talking how we're going to run out sooner than people think and that we're in big trouble. Looking at him, I think people probably thought to themselves, "okay, if a guy like this says we're runnning out and in big trouble, then we must be." Similar effect for others including Matt Simmons and Roscoe Bartlett who both came off quite well.

As far as when it's going to be on DVD and that type of stuff: I have no idea. I'm totally out of the loop on that type of thing. My only role was they showed up here with a camera and I ran my mouth for a few hours.

Best,

Matt

[LadyRuby]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MattSavinar', 'A')s far as the rest of the movie: the one thing that stood out for me when trying to put myself in the shoes of somebody who is new to this is all the people who appear in the film are the FURTHEST thing from the usual alarmist, Berkely-archetypes that end up in films warning us about how fucked we are for destroying the "Mother Goddess", or something along those lines.

[PeakOiler]

I'm planning on seeing 'Oil Crash' this Thursday afternoon at the Alamo Draft House cinema in Austin. I guess Matt will be back in Ca. by then.
I'll post more later after I've seen the documentary, if I get in. I don't have a sxsw film festival wristband.

South by Southwest Film Festival

[MattSavinar]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PeakOiler', 'I')'m planning on seeing 'Oil Crash' this Thursday afternoon at the Alamo Draft House cinema in Austin. I guess Matt will be back in Ca. by then. South by Southwest Film Festival

[PeakOiler]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MattSavinar', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PeakOiler', 'I')'m planning on seeing 'Oil Crash' this Thursday afternoon at the Alamo Draft House cinema in Austin. I guess Matt will be back in Ca. by then. South by Southwest Film Festival

[Plunsfo]

I saw the movie in Austin. My assessment was -- OMG! The movie was outstanding.

I went to see it at the Alamo Drafthouse for its third and last screening during the SXSW film festival and the House Manager said that if the third screening has lots of people show up that there is definitely a big "buzz" going on at the festival about the movie. Guess what? It was a completely full house -- not a single empty seat -- at 4:30 on a Thursday aftenoon. The SXSW emcee who introduced the film (not related to the production) said, "This is the film to see. It's incredibly important."

The Producers say that documentary premiers are lucky to get 10% of the audience to stay behind for Q&A following a screening and at the Alamo about 60% of the audience stayed. People didn't want to leave the theatre. They asked all sorts of questions about oil, alternatives, when the movie was going to be available and so on. And the audience repeatedly thanked the producers for doing the film. The SXSW coordinator had to stop the questioning and tell everyone to leave!

OK, so here's the scoop on the content -- its very credible, very comprehensive. Uses both file newsreel footage and extensive interviews, the film begins with the beginning history of the oil industry and visits some countries and places that have already peaked and shows the consequences to those places, then the key relationship between oil and war dating back to WWII, followed by an excellent explanation of Hubbert's Peak, the true reliability of reported global reserves (in a stunning statement by former OPEC Sect'y Gen'l Chalabi), the true cost of oil and why that's a problem (it's too cheap), and then what the future potentially holds -- including discussions of multiple alternative energy options and whether or not they are the silver bullet to save us. Colin Campbell, Simmons, Savinar, David Goodstein, Roscoe Bartlett, oil executives, all conservative heavy hitters basically stating a consistent message about when peak will hit and whether or not we have time to avoid significant global consequences. This movie is, without a doubt, a call to immediate action. And the very last sentence uttered in the film is intensely sobering (but I won't spoil it by telling you what it is.)

People leave the theatre stunned -- no other way to describe it. I personally think this is the movie for both people new to the peak oil theory and people who think they know a little about it. It should also play at every PTA and Chamber of Commerce meeting across the country. I can't wait for it to become available in the mainstream.

There is also a critics review posted at:
http://www.salon.com/ent/movies/review/ ... print.html

When it comes out -- go see it -- and bring your friends and your family, and their friends. Nobody will have to prompt a discussion amongst your companion viewers after watching the film. It'll just happen.

[Grimnir]

"When it comes out"? Is this going to be a regular in-the-theaters movie?

[Basil]

I'm the director of OilCrash. We're just launching the film by going to festivals with it. Next after SXSW will be HotDocs in Toronto:
OilCrash screening times at HotDocs, Toronto, are:
Screening # 1:April 30, 2006, 9:15 PM, Bloor Cinema
Screening # 2:May 4, 2006, 11:45 PM, Bloor Cinema
We're at the moment still "polishing" the film to make it look even better for the big screen.
Already the reception in Austin was very favorable and salon.com wrote a rave review: http://www.salon.com/ent/movies/review/ ... ndex1.html - you'll have to go the second page of this article.
Some people complained about OilCrash being depressing - well, we can't give it a happy end... Sorry. It's designed to be a wake up call.
We're confident to get a theatrical release and after that the distributors will make DVDs available and get OilCrash on cable TV and free TV in as many countries as possible. The interest we're getting for the film is overwhelming and we feel we're just about to see a big increase in public awareness - after all those years of denial.
Basil, www.oilcrashmovie.com

[clv101]

Basil - that all sounds very positive, I can't wait to see it. That's the problem, the waiting! Are we likely to have DVDs by the summer?

[Basil]

My guess would be early automn - but it really is up to the distributors.

[aldente]

Welcome on the board, Basil. It is an honor to have the 'man himself' join this forum. All the best to get your production cost back in, the movie sure seems to have the potential, very good first reviews and the very topic nature....well, that however remains to be seen. PO seems to be a monkey wrench in the average reasoning brain out there, probably and as you mentioned yourself already because by default there is no 'happy end' or 'escape route' built in.

[Lore]

I for one am certainly looking forward to wider distribution of the documentary. Living here in the New South, a prime example of where urban sprawl has lead us, I would love to get this into a few local screenings. Time for my neighbor’s wakeup call!

[PeakOiler]

Time for a "bump up" since another thread on "Oil Crash" has been posted and a lot of readers won't necessarily search "Current Events" all the way to page 7 or 8. In addition, since there are new members, some may not have seen this thread.

[grabby]

I hope you make it clear how stupid alternate fuels are, they are going to be the downfall of our ecology and will do absolutely notihing.

an ethanol plant producing 1,000,000 gallons a day when spread around the US will be like puttin in 1 tablespoon of ethanol in each tank of 30 gallons of gas.

Maybe you could have an ethanol station where you drive up and the guy takes a tablspoon and throws it into the gas tank and you pay a quarter and you drive off and you run out of gass as you pull into the street.

then they will "get it":

In the movie can you have a sceene where there are barrels of oil lined up, and you pan back and bac and start flying along the oil barrels at faster and faster speeds crossing kansas california pacific ocean hawaii australia china europ atlantic newyork and back to Kansas then go around again doubling the barrels and when done you say THIS IS HOW MANY BARRELS WE USE IN ONE DAY!

that should be the close of the movie.

When people see this, they will "get it"

you could put my nanme in the credits as "grabby"

thanks.

[auscanman]

I just got back from seeing Oil Crash Movie here in Toronto, and overall I'd give it 7/10.

The movie covered a broader spectrum of PO doomerosity than End of Suburbia, with some of those interviewed claiming solutions could be found and others laying bare a much bleaker worst case scenario than was presented in EoS. It didn't go into anywhere near the same depth of analysis as EoS in terms of presenting the likely effects of the progression of PO over the short and long term. The impression given was that everything will be pretty much normal until we hit the peak, then within a matter of a few years we'll find ourselves living a pre-industrial age lifestyle.

The visuals were far better than those in EoS. The scenes contrasting the optimism and affluence of Texas, part of Venezuala and particularly Azerbaijan in the early 1900s with the depleted, abandoned and rusting state of the infrastructure that remains today were particularly effective. I never knew that Baku was at one time one of the most affluent cities in the world- the opposite is clearly the case today. These scenes were included early on and shocked the predominantly pseudo-intellectual audience into actually taking the rest of the film seriously.

The film took on the effect that China and India will have in more detailed analysis than did EoS, though I don't think many in the audience fathomed the sheer amount of resources those nations will devour with the exponential function, or that they will be competing with them for what oil remains.

The film finally went through the same EoS analysis of discrediting all the alternatives that will supposedly save the day. The producers interviewed a lot of unversity professors to provide strong backing for their assertions, rather than merely relying on Matt Simmons assertions, as EoS did. All the professors clearly indicated that some of these could be viable alternatives with a HUGE amount of further research and investment (20+ years).

What was annoying was the insertion of clips from the 50s or 60s in between every segment of the film. I think everyone understood after the 4th one that back then people thought the US would continualy increase its oil production, and everything would be hunky dory.

The film interviewed a number of the usual suspects, such as Matt Simmons and Colin Campbell. Matt Savinar from lifeaftertheoilcrash website was very heavily featured, however, a statement that he made; that he wouldn't vote for a party that would try to power down the US economy really discredits him in my mind. An eq-Iraqi oil minister and an Azerbaijani official were also featured. Roscoe Bartlett, Republican congressman for Maryland was surprisingly PO aware, and appears quite the doomer, conceding that he's aware of the carrying capacity concept and the possibility of a large post PO die-off!

I don't see this film having much of an effect honestly. Anyone with any intellect and curiosity would be able to connect the dots by this point and would have found out about PO on their own. In the Q and A session after, the producers said they felt their film was distinguishd from EofS in that EoS was an 'activist' film, whereas they were trying to create mainstream awareness. I was disappointed to hear most in the audience talking about SUVs being the real problem as they were leaving, or that alternatives would actually save the day. I truly think it will take something shocking for the reality of PO to sink in with 99+% of the population. Since the frequency of hearing of a particular concept seems of greater significance than reasoned analysis for the majority of individuals in accepting that concept, this film will at least add to the growing chorus of outlets using the term of PO.

[auscanman]

Heres' the link to the website for the movie:
Oil crash Movie

[MyOtherID]

Can't wait to get this via bittorrent.

If anyone sees it available, please post a link.

[killJOY]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')hese scenes were included early on and shocked the predominantly pseudo-intellectual audience into actually taking the rest of the film seriously.

[mrobert]

Is the movie available someplace on DVD, download (legally purchased offcourse) ?

[Golgo13]

Looking forward to seeing this one.