Join the Alabama Rivers Alliance and partners across the state at The Altamont School for the FREE premiere screening of the 2023 Southern Exposure films! This inspiring evening of film + discussion is an opportunity to catch up with what’s happening with ARA and our partners across Alabama and how you can help.

Friday, September 22

5 – 6 pm

Celebration Reception with hors d’oeuvres and beverages

Mix & mingle with ARA’s partner organizations and meet the filmmakers

6 pm

Films Begin with audience Q & A with the filmmakers and local experts after

8:30 pm

After Party celebration at Rojo!

Created in six weeks during the summer, the 2023 Southern Exposure films celebrate special people and places in Alabama while exploring complex issues and solutions. In this collection, we’ll explore the Sipsey Wilderness through the eyes of a “city girl” and see why our special places need to be protected for all Alabamians. We’ll learn about real wastewater solutions being implemented in the Black Belt, bringing justice to areas that have long been overlooked and underserved for these basic needs. We will meet three Indigenous people who have felt the call to protect their land, and we will hold ADEM’s feet to the proverbial fire as we question why a landfill was left essentially unregulated for years, resulting in the Moody Landfill Fire that raged for months. Finally, we will see just how precious the mussel is to our ecosystem, while learning about a project that would culminate in the most ecologically significant river reconnection project in the history of the United States, right here in Alabama.

ABOUT THE 2023 FILMS

TITLE + DESCRIPTION	IMAGE FROM THE FILM
FL*SHING INJUSTICE Sherry Bradley and Perman Hardy met on an ordinary Friday afternoon. Amid national and international media recognition of the egregious sanitation and health challenges facing counties across the Black Belt, they helped create an extraordinary consortium of community members, academic institutions, nonprofits, and government agencies dedicated to finding practical solutions for wastewater issues throughout the Black Belt in Alabama. The Black Belt Unincorporated Wastewater Project, UAB Sanitation Health and Equity program and other members of the Alabama Rural Water and Wastewater Management Consortium, are utilizing historic state and federal infrastructure funding to implement real solutions on the ground, transforming communities through education and bringing justice to areas that have long been overlooked and underserved for these basic needs.	CLICK HERE TO WATCH A SHORT TRAILER.
MUSSEL MEMORY Dams have completely altered the species makeup, flows, and habitat of many of our most important river systems. In Alabama, home to some of the greatest biodiversity in the nation, Claiborne and Miller’s Ferry Locks and Dams have prevented migratory fish, like the sturgeon and Alabama Shad, from accessing their historic runs from the Gulf of Mexico up the Alabama River to their spawning grounds in the Cahaba River since they were built in the 1970s. These barriers have also left endangered and threatened mussels unable to reproduce and in peril of dying out. MUSSEL MEMORY explores the significance of reconnecting river systems and protecting Alabama's freshwater mussels, our natural water filtration system. Join scientists, conservationists, engineers and anglers as they fight to restore fish passage along the Alabama and Cahaba Rivers. A project of this magnitude would culminate in the most ecologically significant river reconnection project in the history of the United States, right here in Alabama.	CLICK HERE TO WATCH A SHORT TRAILER.
THEY NEVER LEFT: Indigenous Return and Reclamation in the Southeast “We are our ancestor’s wildest dreams, and we are still here". Some Indigenous people were never forced to leave what is now known as Alabama, and many across the continent are still intimately connected to their sacred homelands. Meet three Indigenous people who are answering their ancestor’s prayers to reclaim traditional lifeways, protect the environment, and teach us all how to better our relationships with the natural world and Native Nations.
TRASHED Landfills are an out-of-sight, out-of-mind part of everyday life in America, but in Alabama, they have long been a case for noxious odors, air and water pollution, and a lax regulatory environment that leaves communities vulnerable to environmental and health hazards. In the aftermath of a 2022 landfill fire near Birmingham that raged for months, suffocating multiple counties in smoke and odor, nearby residents demanded answers. They questioned how this was allowed to happen, why this company was not held accountable for years of violations, and what could be done to demand more from the Alabama Department of Environmental Management. This film holds ADEM’s feet to the fire, as non-profit organizations like Cahaba Riverkeeper, Gasp and Friends of Pinchgut Creek lead the charge to protect the water and air for nearby residents.
WHEREVER YOU GO, THERE YOU ARE Director Lily Ahree Siegel goes on a playfully sardonic escapade as she ventures beyond city limits – and air conditioning – into the Sipsey Wilderness in Northwest Alabama. It is her home state, after all; a land she once passed, but never knew. Will meeting others who are in tune with the spell this area cast help reconcile that Wilderness is for her too?	CLICK HERE TO WATCH A SHORT TRAILER.
LULLABY FOR SIPSEY In this micro-short film, enjoy as a captivating poem unfolds, gently celebrating the profound beauty found in the intricate details of the Sipsey Wilderness.	CLICK HERE TO WATCH A SHORT TEASE.

Special thank you to the special people who make Southern Exposure happen!

Dell Brooke | Michele Forman

Vickey Wheeler 

Matthew J Grcic | Jess Lingle | David Shaddix

Scot Duncan | Nelson Brooke | Charles Scribner 

Mel Warren and Ann Phillipi Warren | Joy and James Myers

Bob McKenna | Clubhouse on Highland

Alabama State Council on the Arts

& Alabama Rivers Alliance’s 

partner organizations