Videos conflict with @tammierosen explanation for excluding ticket-holding farmers at #TFF2013 @Gaslandmovie II premiere. Her explanation:
“Gasland Part II had its World Premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival. Guests that had purchased advance tickets and were in line for the film 30 minutes prior, as our ticket policy states, were admitted into the screening. Once the house was at capacity, the remaining ticket holders who had not been in line prior to 30 minutes were unfortunately not able to be accommodated in the theater.”
One can have ground rules for behavior at an event, but excluding potential critics before the fact and stifling open discussion is not a path toward progress.
I’ve had my own experience dealing with a disruptive appearance by Phelim McAleer (more here), the “Frack Nation” filmmaker accompanying the batch of Marcellus-region farmers and landowners who had tickets for the event. So I recognize the risks, but closing the doors to discussion is not solution. This is particularly true given that McAleer’s film-making approach is remarkably similar to that of Josh Fox.
Here’s an excerpt from one of the first Tribeca reviews of the film, by Eric Kohn in IndieWire:
“The director’s activism naturally stirs up trouble, and while most of “Gasland Part II” lets its countless subjects lead the way, the story eventually returns to his personal antics: The finale involves a well-documented 2012 incident in which the filmmaker was arrested on Capitol Hill after attempting to film a congressional hearing on fracking; he handles the situation well, but ultimately gains nothing except another illustration of how much his hands are tied — by getting them cuffed. In this David versus Goliath tale, Goliath still has the upper hand. ‘Gasland Part II’ runs longer than the earlier installment, but ultimately it has less to say. Fox sounds the same alarm with a bizarre mixture of confidence in the message and an awareness of the vanity involved in delivering it.”
