Saving Walden’s World 

Director: James S Merkel

Run Time: 88 minutes

A  film that has its roots in Belfast, Maine is coming to the City Theater in Biddeford for a very special screening with author and filmmaker, Jim Merkel on August 11 at 4:00 p.m. Come learn how and why the documentary “Saving Walden’s World” was created, taking Merkel around the world for research, filming, and screenings of this uniquely personal film on women’s empowerment, culture, and steps that are being taken globally to develop sustainable living and food solutions. 

The documentary Saving Walden’s World is a project with a long life, both in development and screenings, as it is now a featured selection at several global film festivals, including the Puerto Aventuras International Film Festival (PAIFF), Love & Hope International Film Festival, in Barcelona, Spain, Crown Wood International Film Festival in Kolkata, West Bengal, India and the Five Continents International Film Festival in Puerto La Cruz, Venezuela. This is a rare opportunity to meet the filmmaker and see why the film is garnering international attention, along with questions and answers and socializing.

Saving Walden’s World looks at what is working today and how these solutions can shape a better tomorrow. Director and writer Jim Merkel weaves a story that spans his early personal experience as a military subcontractor and his later studies of three countries where non-capitalist cultures thrive.

Whatever your perspective, Saving Walden’s World is a worthy cinematic journey. Jim Merkel and his talented team deliver an entertaining and enlightening story that includes a future with hope.

“This film will stir your heart.”—Vicki Robin, Author, Social Innovator

“Jim Merkel offers a special mix of practicality and idealism; a workable mix.”

   —Bill McKibben, Climate Activist, Author                                      

“As a former engineer working on weapons who went through a dramatic change in consciousness, his words have a special power.”— Howard Zinn, author of A People's History of the United States

with

Earthling

Directors: Molly Graham and Keith Lane

Run Time: 10 minutes

In the summer of 1976, Jack Weiner, along with his twin brother Jim, and two friends went camping in Maine’s Allagash wilderness, where they were abducted by aliens. It wasn’t until ten years later, and massive changes in their personalities, changes brought on by repressed memories, that the four men explored what happened to them on that trip through hypnosis. Despite people not believing Jack about his encounter with aliens, he stands by his story. Jack considers himself a representative on earth for the aliens he encountered in 1976 - and is still visited by to this day - with an urgent message for all of humanity. We’re destroying the planet, its resources, and each other. Whether you believe in his account or not, the information is an urgent warning to all of humanity. For most of Jack’s life, his story has not been believed. He’s a pariah in his community and has been ridiculed publicly for his account.  Despite this treatment, he stands by his story and has never wavered.  He is resolute in the face of adversity, and his life story is an important lesson in empathy, understanding, and accepting others’ perspectives.

The visual representation of the story is inspired by Jack’s artistic style and artwork, which is surreal, bizarre, and evokes the liminality of his lived experience on the precipice of earth and space, reality and fantasy, and present and future. The animation and narrative’s conceptual imagery convey themes and emotions related to the fear of the unknown, loss of control, and an important message of unity for humanity.  These motifs are expertly illustrated and expressed by Earthling’s illustrator/animator Ameesha Lee, whose moody abstract style echoes precisely the renderings that Jack and his fellow abductees created after hypnosis returned their memories to them.