Extinction. <> Summer Rayne Oakes

We got wind of this just too late to publicize for our hometown favorite Adventure Film Fest (which we’ve media sponsored off and on since its beginning—I attended two films today, Driven and Truck Farm, looooved both)—but, here’s the video trailer.

We have a feeling this’ll be everywhere soon enough—it’s showing in NY, I understand, soon, making the film fest circuit generally. We have an interview with our longtime elephriend Summer Rayne Oakes scheduled soon—but for now, a glimpse:

Short film produced. shot, and directed by filmmaker Clayton Haskell for ABOVE magazine, featuring the Summer Rayne Oakes bee shoot at the Puntacana Ecological Foundation, Domincan Republic. Topic conceived by Summer Rayne Oakes as an artistic awareness tool to get the word out about Colony Collapse Disorder. Music by Moby. The short film was shot on RED ONE 1781 with a set of Zeiss ZF (nikon mount) primes and a Tokina 11-16mm. This was a one man band of a crew, run and gun guerrilla production. Hope you enjoy.

WADE DAVIS, Anthropologist & Author, The Serpent & The Rainbow; The Wayfinders praises “eXtinction”: The film “is an elegy, a poem, a cry from the heart from an inspired artist and devoted sister of the natural world. Summer Rayne Oakes asks that we remember and pay attention.

In the time of her great great grandmother flocks of passenger pigeons eclipsed the sun, and buffalo outnumbered people i…n North America. Salmon colored the western seas, and cod on the Grand Banks were so numerous that ships with a full head of sail struggled against the sheer density of fish in the water.

This exquisite film reminds us not only of what has been lost, but what is still about to be lost. How will you feel when you hear the news that the last lion in the wild has died, that the last elephant has been shot, that the blue whales are no longer? This does not have to happen. There is another possibility.

We can and must choose the option of life, and the beauty and passion of this film helps chart the way forward.” http://extinctionfilm.tumblr.com/

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eXtinction is an environmental art short that brings together powerful storytelling with visceral imagery.

It depicts that the most pressing environmental issues are not happening thousands of years from now, but are in fact happening within our lifetime, and more personally on the timeline of a young woman’s life – from birth to death.

CLAYTON HASKELL (director) takes viewers on a visually stunning journey through space and time, while SUMMER RAYNE OAKES (Producer/Writer/Actress) breathes fervent passion and emotion to the piece through her own personal story and life.

Debuting in 2012 at Film Festivals worldwide. Stay tuned for listings at extinctionfilm.tumblr.com

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“eXtinction is an important film that everyone should see. Clayton Haskell artfully captures the beauty of planet earth, while Summer Rayne Oakes reminds us of the vital role we all have in keeping it that way.”

– HARVEY WEINSTEIN, Co-chair of The Weinstein Company, Co-founder of Miramax Films

“eXtinction is an elegy, a poem, a cry from the heart from an inspired artist and devoted sister of the natural world. Summer Rayne Oakes asks that we remember and pay attention.

In the time of her great great grandmother flocks of passenger pigeons eclipsed the sun, and buffalo outnumbered people in North America. Salmon colored the western seas, and cod on the Grand Banks were so numerous that ships with a full head of sail struggled against the sheer density of fish in the water.

This exquisite film reminds us not only of what has been lost, but what is still about to be lost. How will you feel when you hear the news that the last lion in the wild has died, that the last elephant has been shot, that the blue whales are no longer? This does not have to happen. There is another possibility.

We can and must choose the option of life, and the beauty and passion of this film helps chart the way forward.

– WADE DAVIS, Anthropologist & Author, The Serpent & The Rainbow; The Wayfinders

“Summer Rayne Oakes has produced a stunning short that everyone should see. It is powerful, graphic, and striking, with a lucid and important message we all need to hear.”

– CHRIS PALMER, Director of the Center for Environmental Filmmaking, American University; Author, Shooting in the Wild

“Exquisite, powerful, meaningful and deeply impactful. eXtinction is a call to action indeed.”

– ALYSIA REINER, Actress

“A beautiful production, yet shocking in the short term changes projected for the Earth’s living Environment. It is a perfect tribute to Tom Eisner, a great friend from the first time I met him in the fall of 1950 until his recent and (to me) untimely death.”

– EDWARD O. WILSON, Professor Emeritus, Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard

“Here in images of a rare beauty, is a brutal reminder of what could happen to our planet.„if we do nothing. And also a real message of hope.”

– MAURICE LEVY, CEO of Publicis Groupe

“eXtinction, produced, written and starring environmental warrior and fashion model Summer Rayne Oakes and directed by Clayton Haskell is a terribly realistic yet magically beautiful film about humanity’s plight.

The film depicts the shattering speed at which our planet is deteriorating through the eyes of a remarkable young woman whose love for nature and all its creatures is crushed by the daily disappearance of the wonders she so admired as a child.

I hope many people see eXtinction and in doing so take the full measure of the tremendous challenge at hand.”

– NICOLAS RACHLINE, Editor Above Magazine