Film Review: From Natural Beauty to Sacrifice Zones 'Running for the Mountains' Surveys the Harms of Wanton Resource Extraction
Still wondering why Joe Manchin torpedoed so much of Joe Biden's agenda?
When then-Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and then-Sen. Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona roadblocked much of President Joe Biden’s agenda — including his ambitious “Build Back Better” program, which would have helped combat climate change, as well as his clean energy initiatives — progressives scratched their heads. But Manchin — who, like Sinema, abandoned the Democratic party before retiring from the Senate — had always been a supporter of the fossil fuel industry, famously vowing that the state would “extract every lump of coal” from the ground.
Mining is a deeply traditional occupation in West Virginia, but it’s only become more environmentally destructive even as forms of energy production such as wind and solar have become more effective alternatives. Fracking and mountaintop removal pose long-term risks in exchange for short-term gains… gains enjoyed by industry, while the state’s people face the devastation left behind. Filmmakers Babette Hogan and Julie Elsenberg set out to look at how corporate influence stymies efforts to protect and preserve the environment, and found in West Virginia a cautionary tale that is still unfolding. As one interviewee puts it, “West Virginia has become a sacrifice zone.”
It’s a terrifying turn of phrase, but it’s not unwarranted. Equally terrifying is the way civil rights and liberties are trampled, apparently at corporate behest. Footage shows a police officer wandering around on private land taking video of the license plates of vehicles parked their, the owners evidently having come to participate in a protest march. At another point, one of the filmmakers sees a civilian seemingly direct an officer to approach her; the officer arrests her, claiming that she has filmed him and “I don’t appreciate it.” These moments are of a piece with a journalist recounting how members of the press are targeted and removed first by police during actions against protestors.
As the doc delves into the state’s political history, and Manchin’s place in it, it reminds the viewer of how provisional Manchin’s political rhetoric was and how ironclad his industry alliances proved to be — to the point that when he lost the Democratic gubernatorial primary in 1996, he pivoted to creating a PAC that attacked the winner of the primary, Charlotte Jean Pritt, and supported Cecil Underwood, Pritt’s opponent for the office, despite having previously called for support for whomever the Democratic primary winner might be. (A campaign of smear ads accused Pritt of having wanted to teach first graders about condoms. Underwood won the race.)
In today’s political climate, with more environmentally-friendly methods of energy production being systematically derailed in favor of a renewed push on fossil fuels, the situation hardly seems poised to improve — nor do the attitudes of the politicians who, in theory, represent the people of their state. (One functionary accepts copies of studies showing the harms of fossil fuel use only to promptly toss them in the trash can.) That makes the images of destroyed mountains, harassed protestors, and polluted streams all the more heartbreaking, particularly as viewed in contrast to images of the state’s remaining natural beauty.
West Virginia natives speak on screen of a mixture of pride in the state’s longstanding contributions to America’s energy supply and exasperation at the way the state’s resources continue to be extracted in ways that leave behind a legacy of environmental destruction and human exploitation. One man suggests that notions of “patriotism” that tie sacrifice, and sacrifice zones, to duty need to be recast. But the history the film looks back on — including a miner uprising that was met with lethal force by the U.S. government — suggests that what progress has happened in terms of rights for the miners were a blip, rather than lasting gains.
Still, the fight goes on.
“Running for the Mountains,” a First Run Features release, is streaming now at Kanopy and Amazon Prime.