There are better movies of two hours length. I loved the actress'performance.

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

I was excited to learn a bit more about what motivates groups like the ELF, but only learned about one kids predicament. Daniel was difficult to relate to, and simply put, comes across as brat who didn't peak until he met a bunch of outcasts, and I'm not sure if going to prison is the best type of "making it" one should aspire to. As someone who is passionate about this cause, I really wanted to find something redeeming in this organization, but alas, I walked away from the film the same way I feel about groups like PETA and The Discovery Network. More so, I left not knowing what the objective of the ELF really is, instead just watched a film on a group of young brainwashed kids who act first and worry about consequences later. And when consequences do come, they complain about the harsh sentences (granted it is a bit harsh, but what again, research first before you do something you KNOW is illegal.) I didn't walk away from the film feeling sympathetic to the plight of these members nor do I feel like I got a "behind the scenes look" at the ELF. (Unless of course the ELF is comprised of self-righteous mid- thirty-year-old who still don't understand the concept of crime and punishment.) Perhaps the description should be updated as the whole film was really about Daniel and not so much about their mission of the ELF. Good soundtrack though.

If you go back in history and read about real heroes you can get a clear idea about what exactly is wrong with our society today.. Greek heroes during the Greek rebellion in 1821 opted for torture and death upon their arrest instead of surrendering key information to the Ottomans. Mexican Commander Antonio López de Santa Anna when he got arrested after the battle of San Jacinto begged for his life and signed the Treaties of Velasco, in which he agreed to withdraw his troops from Texan soil and, in exchange for safe conduct back to Mexico, lobby there for recognition of the new republic (which led to the independence of the state of Texas. And what about activists you might ask? Well this movie will tell you a lot about their courage, determination, perseverance and a whole bunch of life skills they claim to carry..

In 2005, former Earth Liberation Front (ELF) member Daniel McGowan is arrested, along with a dozen others, in a co-ordinated operation to bring to justice those responsible for a series of arson attacks over the previous decade. McGowan is implicated for his role in a number of these attacks, and faces a double life sentence if he continues to refuse to take a plea (and, in doing so, turn on his former comrades). Under house arrest in his sister's New York apartment, McGowan invites Marshall Curry in to document the period up to his imprisonment.The ELF are not an easy organization to categorize; formed seemingly out of the believed futility of peaceful and non-violent demonstration to protect the 'raping' of the environment, they use economic warfare (in the form of property destruction) to make their points instead. McGowan, a late-comer to the organization but one who quickly uses his charm and passion for the cause to rise through the ranks, does not deny any of the charges laid before him. Rather, Curry is granted insider accounts from not merely the arrestee but also a number of his co-conspirators (even, most notably, the snitch who gave McGowan and his accomplices up in the years after the arson attacks).Curry's film is not a propaganda film for McGowan, or even the ELF; it doesn't throw statistics at you regarding the extent of logging or the dangers of genetically-modified food (two of the organization's targets for attacks). Rather, it serves to establish a landscape more complex than the simplistic 'eco-terrorist' slur used to describe McGowan et al, without necessarily demanding sympathy for their bleak position and future.The ELF's case is nevertheless made strongly: in all the EDF's actions - and they number over 1200 incidents - not a single human casualty results, and the targets are invariably large organizations and corporations. The eco-warrior McGowan is at pains to stress their actions as mere 'property destruction', and it is hard to argue otherwise - particularly with the poignant NY backdrop - yet Curry is even-handed enough to also interview the workers and families of those whose workplaces have been destroyed. To them, the destruction of property is not a means to an end (however noble), but a misunderstanding of what it is they do. An Oregonian logging executive, whose offices were targeted by the ELF in 2001, is therefore equally convincing in arguing that by definition, he is also an 'environmentalist' - for every tree his business cuts down, six have to be planted, and further, if there were no trees left, there would be no logging business either.The points raised on both sides are relevant and thought-provoking; it is patently clear no- one is out to do serious harm, either to the environment or to the workers, yet both sides remain at loggerheads over whose supposed 'crime' is worse. And while the battle goes on, everyone continues to suffer. There is clearly a middle-way between the tree-hugging environmentalism of the ELF and the business-savvy but ecologically-dependent corporations and businesses they target, but why hasn't it been found?Concluding Thought: MacGowan may well not be a 'terrorist' in the sense of a suicide bomber seeking maximum casualties, but the arson attacks are undoubtedly intended to instill a degree of fear to encourage desired political action. That is still terrorism.

This documentary covers a lot of territory while following the compelling story of a man whose youthful conversion to activism lands him in the US torture prison grid branded a terrorist.This film has much to say about authority, youth, environmental activism, environmental destruction for profit, and finally, about a country using the war on foreign terrorists as a pretext to practice terror on its own citizens through the use of ridiculously aggressive sentencing and detention practices.We are asked to question if the cost of ELF destruction compares to the destruction of oil, gas, timber and mining companies across the USA, to say nothing of what the US war machine does abroad. The FBI is represented by a thorough but ultimately sad apologist agent who eventually admits to feeling 'circumspect' about jailing dedicated, idealistic young American citizens to isolation gulags.The automated, unthinking flip-side of authority is shown in the grinning face of a local cop from Eugene who's been on the front line of protests and is convinced of his righteousness in just doing his job. Yet another officer redeems himself saying he prefers to prosecute crimes, not terrorist acts.For a documentary, many characters take form. We see the faces of authority in various forms of dedication, moral contortion and ignorance. We see the fragile morality of youth, with us knowing its collision with cynical reality is just around the corner (thanks to an excellent job of revealing events in the editing). We also see the glory of people battling a system of exploitation on its own terms, and finally, a corrupt justice system willing to exert more harsh terror on its highest moral watch-guards than on polluters, arms dealers and war criminals.The actions of ELF are eventually tied into the WTO protests in Seattle, and the larger movement that was taking shape before 911. The film only nominally mentions what was ELF's biggest selling tool at the time, that it always claimed to have no center, and proposed the notion that each person should be their own activist. The similarities to other activist organizations in this regard was perhaps too similar to promote.Regardless, the film is incredibly dramatic in scope for a documentary, encapsulating the 90s and 00s in the USA, and the transition US democracy has taken forwards and/or backwards in that time. The conflicts it explores, mainly freedom vs security, are as old as civilization, but the canvas is as large as ever.