Now that award mania has delivered us a sufficient dose of best-worst dressed, back-patting, and thank yous, it’s time for most of us to get around to actually watching these movies people have been so happily decorating with praise. Instead of hopping in your car and driving to your nearest Blockbuster, you might consider that Netflix is saving the world. And the golden Oscar’s turned green.

Okay, this might be hyped up hyperbole, but it is nice to see such things considered. While the academy never actually mentions what they’ve done to shrink their eco-footprint, the acknowledgement of their effect on the climate is at the very least a forward step. And while Netflix is a better option than driving to the video store yourself, the best option is still to hop on your bike or enjoy a nice walk. Netflix does not, to my knowledge, invest in carbon offsetting for their service, but perhaps we can make them understand the good (not to mention great publicity) they could achieve through this.

Change is rarely a speed demon, and it is important to acknowledge these baby steps. But it is even more important for us, as consumer’s, to push these clumbsy first steps into a mature, full run.

**Update** Rather than give the actors who presented the awards more useless materials to clutter their home (diamond-encrusted bra and panty set, anyone?) the 79th Oscar presenters received the Lohachara sculpture and a year’s worth of off-sets. The sculpture is named for an island which “In December, 2006, became the first inhabited island to be lost to rising sea levels caused by global warming.”

Sadly, a year’s worth of off-set’s for the average celebrity lifestyle is 100,000 tons reduction; enough to balance 20,000 miles of driving, 40,000 miles on commercial airlines, 20 hours in a private jet and a large house in Los Angeles,” which for some is not even enough! Compare this to an average Joe’s off-set of 30 metric tons of greenhouse gas reduction, translating to “12,000 miles of driving, six commercial plane flights, and a large home.” Let’s hope this beautiful sculpture will inspire these stars to not only invest in carbon off-setting, but also to work towards reducing their footprint through daily activities.

C.S.A is an amazing movie made by one of our own jayhawkers, Kevin Willmott. It is a poignant mock-umentray following our country’s timeline if the confederates had won the war. There are interviews interspersed with old footage and fake commercials. The aspect that is truly shocking is the commercials for actual products and their frequently blatant racism. The film balances the weight of the issue with humor, all the while highlighting how far we are from exorcising our demons.

UPDATE 2/20: The website (and trailer) for Kevin Wilmott’s new film, Bunker Hill, is now live online. Check it out.

A while back Brady and I went to see An Inconvenient Truth, which sparked the ol’ synapses. This movie made hard-to-grasp concepts tangible to me and created a deeper understanding of our place, or what our place should be, on this planet. While everyone’s opinions should be formed singularly, the documentary provides education I feel we have a responsibility to listen to and share. Which makes the recent rejection of this free educational tool by NSTA, with their hands still clutching the big oil companies hand-outs, all the more heinous. The power of movies and their ability to inspire change is still just beginning to be explored.

I recently discovered participate.net, a website devoted to harnessing and unleashing this potential upon the world. Many times a documentary has ignited within me a spark of energy only to fade away. Participate.net provides a kind of kindling, through education, opportunities and communities, to allow that initial spark of change to grow into a motivating fire under my backside. You should check it out. A couple other movies that have recently moved me are Hotel Rwanda and Catch a Fire.

What movies have sparked your interest lately? Have you used participate.net already and if so what are your impressions of it?