Island Breath: Wal-Mart America

cartoon of WalMart World by Ron Zalme

big happenings with the Wal-Mart movie
by Robert Greenwald on 1 November 2005

It has been a wild couple of weeks as the release of our Wal-Mart film gets closer, and Wal-Mart gets angrier.

We really touched a nerve in Bentonville when we released an extended video of former Wal-Mart manager Weldon Nicholson, just one of the stories we tell in the film. A manager for 17 years, he confesses deeply personal stories about his crisis of conscience, how it was to see workers who couldn't afford to eat, marking family businesses for destruction, and bribing local officals. Watch extended scenes from our interview with Weldon here:

http://www.walmartmovie.com/confessions/

The response -- as you might expect from a multi-billion dollar company -- has been swift, ruthless, mean and vitriolic. Six weeks after we announced the film in June, Wal-Mart hired Ronald Reagan's image guru, and one of Bill Clinton's media consultants to set up the best campaign-style war room money can buy, who last week, released to the press both a video and 12 pages of attacks on me and the trailer (not the film, the trailer). The most incredible part was the three pages of bad reviews from my older films -- dating back to 1980!

Big mistake. Now that Wal-Mart has made this a war, it's brought the campaign to the Today Show, and landed us on the front page of the New York Times, hours before the sold-out premiere tonight in Union Square benefiting Wal-Mart Free NYC.

http://nytimes.com/2005/11/01/business/01walmart.ready.html

This is it. With the movie and the incendiary secret memo leaked to Wal-Mart Watch, we can really go on the offensive, and we need your help.

Call your local newspaper or tv/radio station to cover this story. Get a copy of the film and show it at every possible place. Give copies away. Make sure churches, schools, libraries and workplaces all have copies and play them loud and regularly. Call the office of your elected official and ask what they are doing to fight Wal-Mart.

Tomorrow is the San Francisco premiere benefiting Alternet and Equal Rights Advocates, and then back to Los Angeles on Thursday for the premiere with LAANE benefiting their incredible work. On Friday we open for our theatrical run in New York and LA (more coming!), and then on to the massive premiere week mobilization starting Sunday Nov. 13th with screenings, discussions and events all week engaging people in the critical fight around the issues of corporate greed, economic justice, and the kind of country we want to have. Find and RSVP for screenings here:

http://www.walmartmovie.com/find.php

They can out spend us, they can make fancier flyers and brochures and hire more consultants and press agents, but it will all be a vain attempt to smokescreen what Wal-Mart can no longer hide.

See you at a screening!

Robert Greenwald - producer, Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price
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P.S. Screening kits are shipping now, and DVDs start shipping next week, so if you haven't already, get your copy for $12.95, or get a box of 30 for $240 ($8/each) to hand out to all your neighbors. Why not give early holiday presents that just might change the way people buy their holiday presents?

http://www.walmartmovie.com/buy.php

P.P.S. We decided to have some fun with the attack video (actually, it's more like a power point presentation) and well, adjust it to tell our story. Have a look, and a laugh:

http://www.walmartmovie.com/fear_and_smear.php

For another view of WalMart try http://www.wakeupwalmart.com/

1 June 2005 - 8:00am

Click here to see a teaser of the movie Robert Greenwald has made

by Juan Wilson published 1 June 2005

Yes, as you probably know, the short-sighted and visionless Kauai Planning Commission approved the building of a Costco on our island. Big-Box suburbia is accelerating its grip on Puhi and transforming Grove Farms property into a soulless reflection of southern California. Now you can do something to help slow the descent into that inferno.

Robert Greenwald produced and directed OUTFOXED: Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism. Greenwald is now working with BraveNew Films to bring to the world a film about the impact of the biggest business in the world... WAL-MART.

WAL-MART: The High Cost of Low Price takes the viewer on a deeply personal journey into the everyday lives of families struggling to fight goliath. From a small business owner in the Midwest to a preacher in California, from workers in Florida to a poet in Mexico, dozens of film crews on three continents bring the intensely personal stories of an assault on families and American values.

You can help make this film happen. You can share your story, host a screening or contribute money. Click on www.walmartmovie.com to find out more about this project and see a preview of the work to date.