Colin Beavan, the author of No Impact Man and subject of this 2009 documentary, decided to systematically reduce his Manhattan familys consumption, garbage, and carbon impact. The project took a year, which this film dutifully follows. Beavan is media-savvy enough not to wave his finger or come across as a scold. (His book carries the lengthy, self-inoculating subtitle The Adventures of a Guilty Liberal Who Attempts to Save the Planet, and the Discoveries He Makes About Himself and Our Way of Life in the Process.) What Beavan is telling us is obvious. Is No Impact Man a landmark documentary? Is the book a Walden for our time? Not really. Both, in a modest, agreeable fashion, tell us what we already know: We buy too much, we waste too much, and were using up resources disproportionate to our presence on the planet. (NR) BRIAN MILLER
Fri., Sept. 3, 7 p.m., 2010
