The blog formerly known as   Fake Plastic Fish

Category Archives: Video

April 12, 2010

YouTube presents: Bags & Bottles

Canvas Bags music video

Friends have forwarded me a whole slew of fantastic videos recently about plastic bags and plastic bottles.  Here are three that I love.  Please take the time to watch.

Bring Your Canvas Bags

This one is totally addictive.  It starts out slow but builds until you find yourself humming it in your sleep. The video did come out a while ago, but even if you’ve seen it already, why not watch it again?

Life of a Plastic Bag

Taking it down a notch, this 18 minute video narrated by Werner Herzog is weirdly beautiful, if not entirely accurate. A plastic bag suffers an existential crisis after betrayal by the woman who brought him home from the store. If he could find her again, he would tell her one thing. Watch to find out what that one thing is.

The Story of Bottled Water

Annie Leonard has done it again. After explaining the Story of Stuff, she takes us on a journey through the Story of Bottled Water. Check out what Annie learned when she followed the water bottle… Read the rest

March 17, 2010

Captain Moore Paints a Bleak Picture for David Letterman. Now What?

Captain Charles Moore on David Letterman show

Did you guys see Captain Charles Moore on the David Letterman show Monday night? He laid it all out — the complete picture of what our plastic waste is doing to the ocean and ultimately the food we eat and the climate we depend on — in his usual direct style. I’m amazed that Letterman devoted the entire last two segments of the show to this comprehensive discussion and handled it very seriously. If you didn’t see it, please take some time and watch it now.

Here are some of the main points from the first segment, which for some of you will be review and for others will be a revelation:

The trash in the North Pacific Gyre (Great Pacific Garbage Patch) is not a “floating island” as so many people think but is more dispersed.  It’s more like a soup than an island. The trash is 90% plastic. The trash has been accumulating ever since the dawn of the disposable plastic age in the 1950’s. 25% of the trash is debris fr… Read the rest
October 29, 2009

350 Day on the Beach. Where in the World is Beth?

Girl holding 350 Day sign

350.org has released this fantastic video showing actions all over the world that took place on October 24.

So where was I?

The best-laid plans sometimes go awry when unknown locations and strange parking fee machines are involved. By the time I got to the beach in Santa Monica for the 350 Day Blogger Beach Cleanup, the event had already begun. Not to miss out, filmmaker Jan Vozenilek and I ran across the sand as fast as we could toward what we thought was our group. (Click images to see larger size on 350.org website.)

We arrived huffing and panting to a beautiful sand sculpture on Santa Monica Beach, only to realize we were at the wrong event! Who cares? This group was fabulous.

So I hung out on the beach for a while with Jan (who just returned from filming dead albatross chicks on Midway with photographer Chris Jordan) and enthusiastic plastic pollution activist Sarah Kornfeld,

took pictures of my own boobs (in a “Plastic Is Washed Up” T-sh… Read the rest

October 27, 2009

Jackson Browne: Defiant About Bottled Water

Jackson Browne ranting about bottled water

Jackson Browne doesn’t appreciate the bottled water industry pumping millions of dollars into advertising to convince us that bottled water is better than tap water. He also happened to be sitting right behind me during the screening of Tapped Friday night at UCLA, one of the events organized by the new Plastic Pollution Coalition this weekend. So after the film, I asked if he would mind saying a few words to Fake Plastic Fish readers about his stand on bottled water. He said he could only give me a minute, but as you’ll see in the video, once he got started, his passion kicked in and he gave a lot more.

Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uD5gZ7yBZc

For those who are unable to hear the video, here’s a summary of his main points:

Tap water is more highly regulated than bottled water. Often, bottled water is just tap water that bottlers extract, bottle, and sell back to us at an exhorbitant price. Jackson carries his own me… Read the rest
June 8, 2009

Captain Moore has one word for you: Refuse!

Captain Charles Moore saying, "Refuse"

Captain Charles Moore is one of my personal heroes and the man whose work discovering, studying, and bringing the world’s attention to plastics in the oceans changed my own life completely two years ago. So you can bet that when I was invited to attend his presentation at Google in Mountain View last week, I rearranged my work schedule, rented a Zip Car, and got my butt down there.

Captain Moore’s story is the subject of the article commonly known as Plastic Ocean. If you haven’t read it yet, stop what you’re doing and read it now! But be sure to return to this page afterward to listen to his important message for all of us.

Moore is not much taller than I, but his presence is captivating and the force of his conviction, palpable. Wearing a necklace made of plastic found out in the North Pacific Gyre, he is a man who has looked into the abyss, not once but repeatedly, and returned to warn us about it. His eyes twinkle, but they also look … Read the rest

May 19, 2009

Leatherback Sea Turtle friends Plastic Sea Monster at Bay to Breakers 2009 and both win!

leatherback turle and plastic sea monster costumes at Bay to Breakers in SF

No plastic tally this week. Didn’t have time or energy to do it Sunday after WINNING THE COSTUME CONTEST AT THE 2009 BAY TO BREAKERS!

(I’ll add last week’s plastic to my next tally.)

Eli Saddler of Oceanhealth.org and I participated as a leatherback sea turtle and the plastic that kills it in an effort to bring awareness to the problems of plastic in the ocean and encourage Bay to Breakers attendees to bring their own bottles… next time. Mostly, we just had fun. Well, I did. Eli was sweating buckets in his sea turtle costume made of polar fleece from recycled plastic bottles. Who knew the weather in San Francisco would suddenly be so warm?

Click the above image to see our costumes up close. Here’s a short video of the day. We had a blast, and winning in the “Green” division of the costume contest is worth the sunburn I’ve got now. (And yes, I had my sunscreen with me, and no I didn’t remember to apply … Read the rest

April 28, 2009

My Video Thank You to Oprah

Video of Beth reading letter to Oprah

Did any of you catch Oprah’s 2009 Earth Day show?

After interviewing Fabien Cousteau about plastic in the oceans, she had a few “Aha! moments”:

Oprah will think differently about using plastic things: http://www.oprah.com/oprahshow/Oprah-Talks-About-Plastic-Bags-and-the-Environment-Video

Oprah wants to go beyond washing out her zip lock bags: http://www.oprah.com/media/20090422-tows-oprah-aha-moment

I was excited and moved to see this issue garnering the attention of an audience as large as Oprah’s. So moved, in fact, that I wrote her a letter… and then recorded it on video. Now I just have to figure out the best way to reach her with it:

My belief is that once audiences see the horrific images of what plastic does to the environment, they will want to know what they can do. Let’s let Oprah know that there are many of us out here already going beyond washing out plastic bags.

Please feel free to … Read the rest

April 14, 2009

Throwing up Plastic. It’s the Green Moms Carnival!

scene from video The Bay vs the Bag

Welcome to the April edition of the Green Moms Carnival. Fake Plastic Fish is thrilled to be the receptacle of this Pile of Plastic Posts. And speaking of piles of plastic, did you ever wonder what it feels like to throw up a plastic bag? Then you must see this brand new video (just released today) by Free Range Studios, the guys who brought us The Meatrix and The Story of Stuff. Here is The Bay vs. The Bag:

And now, let’s hear what others have to say about plastic!

Marianna from Green Mama’s Pad presents a comprehensive guide to plastics recycling, including a cute video showing a simplified version of the process, as well as facts about bottled water, in her post, Recycling Plastic. She also submitted a post on having an Eco-Friendly Easter when the carnival was originally scheduled to post before Easter.

Speaking of recycling, Diane from Big Green Purse asks, “If it’s not easy to recycle something, is it really recyclable?… Read the rest

March 3, 2009

A Jedi is always prepared…

scene from Michael's movie Reservoir Jedi

… with her/his reusable travel mug or water bottle. And this post is just an excuse to show off the depths of our geekitude last Saturday at San Francisco’s WonderCon comic book convention.

Really, it was a wonderland of plastic… plastic action figures, plastic-wrapped posters, plastic bags, plastic boobs (I think). We only went for the opportunity to dress up in costumes left over from the short film Reservoir Jedi, made by Michael and his friend Andy several years ago, and for the chance to see what Mark Hamill and Carrie Fisher look like up close these days.

But even at a fantasy convention, the rules of Fake Plastic Fish apply. Michael had his Klean Kanteen, I had my travel mug, and we both refused the plastic swag bag offered at the entrance to the fest.

We walked around looking fabulous (I would so totally dress like this every day if I could get away with it) but did not buy anything but coffee. On the way to the convention center, … Read the rest