What’s the project?

The working title of this documentary is currently "My Toxic Backyard" previously “Toxic Asheville.”  Using the stories of one community living on a toxic waste dumping site in Asheville, North Carolina, this documentary examines environmental law, the effect of carcinogens on the body, and a community’s fight for safe drinking water.

for more info go to: http://www.toxicasheville.com/

That’s just one place. I don’t even live there.  Why should I care?

If you think this couldn’t happen to you, you need to see this documentary.  The struggles that this community is still going through are just the examples being presented in a system that has failed them for decades.  What if you found out you had cancer, then you discovered your water was contaminated, then you tried to sue the company responsible, but couldn’t?  Then you fought to get the site, still leaking contaminates into the ground water, cleaned up and nothing happened.  Then you tried to sell your house, but no one wanted to buy it.  What would you do?  What could you do?

Okay so why do you need so much money?  Where’s it going?

I am looking for completion funds to finish this feature length documentary. With just over $10,000 invested in gear, rental, travel and other production expenses, another $5,000 is needed to get to a nicely polished finished product. I need to hire an editor, sound designer, graphics artist, enter film festivals and promote the film.  

The break down would be: $2500 to the editor, $500 to sound design of the finished cut, $500 for graphics work, and $1500 for film festival submission. Festival entry fees for feature films average $50 per submission. With these funds, I could enter at least thirty festivals.

So all you need is $5,000?

This five thousand is just enough to scrape by to completion.  I’ll probably end up shelling out any extra expenses out of pocket.  Anything in excess of five thousand will allow for an even better film.  More money means I can afford to pay for more time from the graphics artist, better sound from the sound designer, more promotion, more film festivals and greater visibility.