Published March 2008
Gimme! Coffee and the 2008 Finger Lakes Environmental Film Festival (FLEFF) present “The Price of Sugar,” a powerful documentary about the sugar trade in the Dominican Republic.
FLEFF Screening
The screening will be held during the closing weekend of the festival in downtown Ithaca, New York.
- Saturday, April 5, 2008
- Finger Lakes Environmental Film Festival, Cinemapolis, 7pm
Cinemapolis will sell fairly traded Las Mingas Relationship Coffee from Gimme! Coffee on the night of the screening. The screening will be followed by a forum on sugar, trade, and labor.
About the Film
Just a few miles inland from the tourist-filled beaches of the Dominican Republic, hidden from view, thousands of dispossessed Haitians harvest sugarcane, much of which ends up in U.S. kitchens. They work grueling hours and frequently lack decent housing, clean water, electricity, education or healthcare. “The Price of Sugar” follows Father Christopher Hartley, a charismatic Spanish priest, as he organizes some of this hemisphere's poorest people, challenging powerful interests profiting from their work. The film raises questions about the origins of the products we consume and at what human cost they are produced.
‘Dramatic and Riveting’
“The Price of Sugar” has been praised by critics and audiences across the country.
- “This eye-opening doc...is nothing short of blistering.”
- - Nick Schager, Slant Magazine
- “Uplifting and enraging in equal measures....(has) one of the most compelling heroes of any movie this year.”
- - Jim Hemphill, reel.com
- “Haney has taken a story of outrage and injustice and made a film that's as much an inspiring story of spiritual awakening as it is a call to action.”
- - Ann Hornaday, Washington Post
FLEFF Partnership
Founded in 1997, the Finger Lakes Environmental Film Festival at Ithaca College embraces sustainability across all of its forms: economic, social, ecological, political, cultural, technological, and aesthetic. It links the local with the global. And it showcases Ithaca College as a regional and national center for thinking differently — in new ways, interfaces, and forms — about the environment and sustainability.
Gimme! Coffee supports FLEFF's sustainability mission:
- In 2007, we sponsored screenings and a forum discussion of “Black Gold,” a documentary about the economic reality of the coffee trade.
- In 2008, we're sponsoring “The Price of Sugar.”
We're thrilled to have one of the world's premiere environmental film festivals right in our hometown, and we hope to support it for years to come.