Community Events at the Festival

Special Screening - Thursday, November 5, 5:30 pm

Filmmaker Alex Rivera visits Centro Hispano for a special pre-screening of his film Papapapá with a series of shorts made by young members of Centro Hispano! Thursday, November 5, 5:30 pm at Centro Hispano, 810 W. Badger Road.

Bagels with a Birder - Saturday, November 7, 7:30 am and Sunday, November 8, 7:30 am

Share bagels and coffee while you learn about and spot Wisconsin's birds—the everyday and the very rare—with expert Madison birders. Saturday & Sunday, November 7 & 8, at 7:30 am. Meet at the entrance to Picnic Point.

Kid Gardeners - Saturday, November 7, 10:00 am

Join Madison kid gardeners as they meet star of What’s on Your Plate? Sadie Rain Hope-Gund, and stay to learn more about Community Groundworks at Troy Gardens. Following the 10 am screening of What's on Your Plate?, Saturday, November 7, at the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art.

What's On Chef Tory's Plate? - Saturday, November 7, Noon

L'Etoile Chef Tory Miller takes What’s On Your Plate? audience members to the Capitol Square for the final outdoor Dane Country Farmer's Market of the season followed by a cooking demo, interactive ingredient display and some tasty local treats! Following the 10 am screening of What's on Your Plate?, Saturday, November 7, at the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art.

Come One, Come All - Saturday, November 7, Noon and 9:00 pm

We are coordinating free transportation on the Saturday of the festival (November 7, 2009) to and from TfPE theaters and Centro Hispano (810 W. Badger Road) for all of Alex Rivera's Films. Vans will depart Centro Hispano 45 minutes prior to the start of each film. For The Sixth Section and Papapapa (which start at noon), vans depart Centro Hispano at 11:15 am. For Sleep Dealer (which starts at 9 pm), vans will depart Centro Hispano at 8:15 pm. Information is available at Centro Hispano, no sign-up required.

Share the Shares - Sunday, November 8, 1:00 pm

Share the Shares is an initiative by the Madison Area Community Supported Agriculture Coalition (MACSAC) to raise funds to purchase six CSA shares that will be donated to the Centro Hispano and First United Methodist Church (FUMC) food pantries. Join us for a conversation with organizers from MACSAC, Centro Hispano and FUMC after the 1pm screening of The Hunger Season, Sunday, November 8, at First United Methodist Church, 203 Wisconsin Avenue. In addition, after The Hunger Season there will be a special meal that will help profile a new national engagement project being built around the film, called "Meal & A Movie in a Box," which was designed through Tales from Planet Earth's pilot screening of the film in October 2008.

Strange Weather - Sunday, November 8, 1:30 to 5:30 pm

Share your own stories about climate change and "strange weather" with student filmmakers, and learn about UW climate change research during our Strange Weather activies Sunday, November 8, from 1:30 to 5:30 pm at the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art.

Wild Madison - Sunday, November 8, 2:00 pm

Stay after our 2 pm acreening of The Adventures of Chico for Wild Madison: local stories "wild, harrowing, and romantic" about Madison's own wildlife and the people who have saved, rehabilitated, and set them free through the Four Lakes Wildlife Center. Sunday, Nov. 8, UW Cinematheque.

A Hot Discussion about Social Capital - Sunday, November 8, 5:30 pm

A conversation about social capital—creating it, growing it, canning it, and leveraging it in times of crisis—with members of Chicago’s Growing Home (featured in Cooked), Madison’s Porchlight, and Madison & Dane County public health professionals. After the Sunday, November 8, 5:30pm screening of Cooked at the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art.

Free Tasting of Porchlight Products - Sunday, November 8, 6:30 pm

Join us with your Cooked movie stub for a free tasting of Porchlight Products at Espresso Royale Cafe. Learn how to provide meaningful employment for Porchlight clients by eating high quality foods made from fresh, local ingredients! What could be more rewarding? Sunday, November 8, at 6:30 pm at Espresso Royale Cafe at 208 State Street.

Multi-Day Community Events

Creature Needs

Who'd believe that Madison's wildlife need paper towels, dish soap, and unscented Kleenex? But they do! Please help out the Four Lakes Wildlife Center by bringing those items to donate at movies all weekend long.

Tweet'n'Meet

Follow and meet Madison's expert birders on their TfPE twitter feed. In the week leading up to the festival they'll be tweeting birding coordinates and birds. @MadBirdersTweet

Take a Load Off . . . (Planet Earth)

With all the travel associated with the festival (filmmakers flying in, films being transported to Madison, and free van travel that we will be providing for underserved audiences), we will be releasing a lot of carbon (CO2) into the atmosphere. Since Tales from Planet Earth is a film festival focused on environmental justice, we decided we needed to make an effort to offset this carbon footprint (locally!!). We will be working to calculate the festival's footprint throughout the weekend and then trying to find socially responsible, local carbon offsets. Help support us by contributing to our offset goals!

In November 2007, the Nelson Institute’s Center for Culture, History and Environment (CHE) partnered with Working Films to host the inaugural Tales from Planet Earth, Wisconsin’s first environmental film festival. Nearly 3,500 people participated in 25 free film screenings and discussions over three days, and many left inspired and motivated by what they saw. We, the organizers, ended the first festival wondering how to mobilize that energy into action.

In particular, we wanted to ensure that, when the lights came up and people felt motivated to do something, their efforts would be directed to local issues at home. In order to harness Madisonians' overwhelmingly positive response to the first festival, CHE and Working Films envisioned the 2009 Tales from Planet Earth as a community and film festival in which numerous partners — organizations right here in Madison — would actively shape and use the festival as a platform for civic engagement.

For the 18 months leading up to the 2009 festival, the folks at CHE developed and nurtured relationships with these community partners. We held dinner-and-a-movie nights, screened rough cuts of films in progress, and identified where and when there was resonance, synergy, and an emotional connection between a film, a local community partner, and its constitutents.

All of this groundwork — from relationship-building, to brainstorming, to field-testing engagement strategies, to audience feedback — became the community-based bedrock not only for Tales From Planet Earth, but also for "Community Engagement Through Film," a graduate/undergraduate-level class taught in lock-step with the community engagement side of the festival. The foundation of the course is Working Films' methodology for how to leverage a film festival — from the press to the "ask" — and puts Working Films' central question — "What can this movie do for your movement?" — into rigorous local service.

Students in our classes have taken these initial ideas and run with them, turning Tales from Planet Earth into a fun, inclusive, and transformative event to engage communities and build more equitable, just, and healthy environments in which people live work and play. Click on any of the community events above to learn more about their broader social justice context and our relationship with the community partners.