Fruitlands Museum to Host 'Food for Thought' Film Festival

The Food for Thought Film Series at Fruitlands Museum this Winter will showcase five documentary films exploring themes of environmental stewardship, community building, and the quest for human expression. Films will be screened on four Wednesdays-January 13, February 10, March 2, and March 23 from 7 to 8:30pm-with a special Family Edition on Sunday, December 20, from 1 to 4pm­-at Fruitlands Museum, 102 Prospect Hill Road, Harvard, MA. Following the screenings, viewers will consider and discuss important questions raised by the spotlight films. For the Family Edition, a wintery craft activity will follow the film. Suggested donation: $5 per person. Light snacks will be served.

March of the Penguins - FAMILY EDITION

Sunday, December 20, Film time: 1-2:30pm; Activities: 2:30-4pm

In the harshest place on Earth, love finds a way. Experience a journey like no other on the planet - one that spans hundreds of miles across a frozen continent. Braving icy winds, freezing temperatures and starvation, this is the incredible true story of an Emperor penguin family's quest to bring new life into the world won the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature. Following the film, families can make their own diorama of a wintery scene. (2005, 1h 26m)

Tiny: A Story about Living Small

Wednesday, January 13, 7-8:30pm

What is home? And how do we find it? One couple's attempt to build a Tiny House raises questions about sustainability, good design, and the changing American Dream. From 1970 to 2010, the average size of a new house in America has almost doubled. Yet in recent years, many are redefining their American Dream to focus on flexibility, financial freedom, and quality of life over quantity of space. These self-proclaimed "Tiny Housers" live in homes smaller than the average parking space, often built on wheels to bypass building codes and zoning laws. TINY takes us inside six of these homes stripped to their essential, exploring the owners' stories and the design innovations that make them work. (2013, 2h)

Trash Dance

Wednesday, February 10, 7-8:30pm

Choreographer Allison Orr finds beauty and grace in garbage trucks, and in the unseen men and women who pick up our trash. Filmmaker Andrew Garrison follows Orr as she rides along with Austin sanitation workers on their daily routes to observe and later convince them to perform a most unlikely spectacle. On an abandoned airport runway, two-dozen trash collectors and their trucks deliver - for one night only - a stunningly beautiful and moving performance, in front of an audience of thousands. (2013, 1h 8m)

American Commune

Wednesday, March 2, 2016

In 1970, 1,500 hippies and their guru, Stephen Gaskin, founded a commune in rural Tennessee. Members forked over their savings, grew their own food, delivered their babies at home and built a self-sufficient society. Raised in this alternative community by a Jewish mother from Beverly Hills and a Puerto Rican father from the Bronx, filmmakers and sisters Rena and Nadine return for the first time since leaving in 1985. Finally ready to face the past after years of hiding their upbringing, they chart the rise and fall of America's largest utopian socialist experiment and their own family tree. The nascent idealism of a community destroyed, in part, by its own success is reflected in the personal story of a family unit split apart by differences. American Commune finds inspiration in failure, humor in deprivation and, most surprisingly, that communal values are alive and well in the next generation. (2013, 1h 30m)

Children of the Arctic

Wednesday, March 23, 2016

Children of the Arctic is a year-in-the-life portrait of Native Alaskan teenagers coming of age in Barrow, Alaska - the northern-most community of the United States. For these teenagers growing up has become a little more complicated than it was for their ancestors who originally named this place "Ukpiagvik" ("where we hunt snowy owls"). They are the twenty-first century descendants of a culture that has endured for millennia on this isolated, but rapidly changing tundra. The harvest of the agvik (bowhead whale) remains the heart of their culture - in the fall, motor boats and modern methods are used, whereas, in the spring, whaling crews use the umiaq (a seal-skin boat made by hand) and ancient traditional methods. Under the weight of societal and environmental issues, these promising teenagers are finding it challenging to sustain the adaptability that has long defined their people in one of the most inhospitable places on earth. (2014, 90m)

Fruitlands Museum Winter Season Hours are weekends, 12-5pm. The Art Gallery, Museum Store & grounds are open; the historic buildings & cafe are closed until April 15, 2016. Winter admission is $5 for nonmembers, and free for members and children under 5 years old. Fruitlands Museum is located at 102 Prospect Hill Road in Harvard, Mass. For more information please visit www.fruitlands.org or call 978-456-3924 ext. 292.

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