Dave and I saw this movie on Friday night. It's about fracking, i.e., extracting gas from our nation's farm lands. Since it was written by Matt Damon and John Krasinski I was surprised at how even handed it was.By the way, there is a documentary out called "Gasland" that must have inspired these guys but I haven't seen where they've acknowledged it.
It was slow moving. There were no overtly bad guys (until the end when we're surprised by how evil one character is.)Matt Damon's character is a gas company guy coming into a poor community trying to get farmers to buy into fracking by offering them boat loads of money. He honestly believes it's the right thing for them to do. His partner, played by one of my favorite actors, Frances McDormand, plays a good person on the surface but, as far as the fracking goes, she doesn't seem to care. She's just doing her job and trying to keep her son in private school. This makes her character a little amoral to me. But my guess is she represents most of us in this respect - sometimes.
John Krasinski plays a different kind of character all together.
The scariest scene in the movie is when Krasinski's character performs a demonstration of what fracking does to the earth in an elementary class room, in front of the kids, on the teacher's desk.
Hal Holbrook's in the movie and he's great, as always. Only, at almost 90 years old in real life, it's hard to accept him as a high school science teacher.
I think the movie is telling us - do your homework. Don't be blinded by fast money. Beware of big corporations. They don't usually leave anything to chance.
If you've ever tried to keep a Walmart from coming into your area you already know this.
I liked the movie. It made me think.
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