Last Call at the Oasis (2011)

I love this movie so much

Such a frustrating disappointment

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

I have already knew that there was a problem with the amount of clean water available in the world due to a class that I took back in Spring of 2013. The one thing I found scary was when they talked about the towns in the US that people were getting sick and some people were dying because of chemicals being in the water and they shouldn't have been. We should be able to depend on our cities and states making sure our water is drinkable. It's also sad that farmers and some citizens in California are not being able to obtain enough water to either water their crops or just drink it. In my state of Kansas, there are parts of the state that have to minimize the amount of water they use during the Summer and they are making it work. Decreasing the time you water your lawn or how long you are taking a shower, makes a difference that many people don't realize. We all need to do are part in helping reduce the amount of water we use everyday. I really enjoyed learning more about the problems we have out there, when it comes to the water shortage and ways that I could do to help decrease the amount of problems with our water. I would recommend other to watch this as well.

I mean, really, how does one film cover the immensity of water? And how does a person take it all in without feeling water-boarded? Last Call at the Oasis figured it out. The film gives just enough information on a range of subjects and uses down-to-earth people who make the issues understandable. I didn't drown in scientific garble! I especially appreciated the Tyrone Hayes' segment on atrazine, a herbicide that has been in the Cornbelt's water (and Midwestern bodies) for decades.I would have given this a 10-star rating, but I think they spent too much time in stargazing at Erin Brokovich. They could have spent some of that time bringing in an expert from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration who could explain more about storm surge and how we need to prepare for water's destructive forces. I wish I left the theater more optimistic than when I went in, but I guess filmmakers can't produce miracles. Only truth.

Last Call at the Oasis was very well-received at Austin's SXSW Film Festival. This is hardly surprising since Austin has a reputation as an environmentally conscience city and all of Texas has been suffering from a drought. The film is a very well-organized and sophisticated presentation about the problems around water both in the U.S. and internationally. In doing so the filmmakers (some of whom worked on the excellent film Food, Inc.) are drawing attention to a subject that is rarely discussed. They discuss a whole range of issues including the future shortage of fresh water, effects of climate change, environmental water pollution by industrial polluters, pollution caused by pesticides, and the privatization of water through the bottled water industry. They offer a number of solutions including conservation and behavioral change, water recycling, repairs to the water infrastructure, more efficient agriculture, and somewhat less enthusiastically desalinization. They use a wide range of footage from around the U.S., Australia, and the Middle East. The presentation between different issues and places flow together quite seamlessly. The film is a wake-up call on an issue that is often politically invisible. While solutions exist, they make clear that what is absent is the political will to address a serious long-term problem that hasn't penetrated the popular consciousness. Like so many other issues, politicians don't want to think about it if it doesn't have any immediate consequences for their next re-election. The film is impressive and a bit terrifying. This is both a weakness and a strength. They are attempting to draw attention to an important issue that is being widely ignored, but at the same time they seem to fall into the alarmist tone of impending doom that is often – some would say too often - heard from the environmental movement. I've heard academic scholars (particularly those who study the Middle East) talk about future water wars and an impending water crisis for more than 20 years and somehow the crisis never quite arrives. Sometimes creating a little fear is necessary to promote political and behavioral change, but it can also lead to despair, anger, and frustration. This approach can also undermine the credibility of the doom-sayers if they appear to be crying wolf about a crisis that never arrives. Either way, Last Call at the Oasis is a valuable and informative presentation that many Americans need to hear about since this issue isn't even on most of our political radar screens yet.

This documentary exceeded my expectations. I at first was a little worried about seeing this movie with a name such as "last call at the oasis". But the flow of the story with superb cinematography and good sound really kept me GLUED to my seat. With special appearances by a few well known celebrities I really felt that those made the movie go from good to great. The movie started out scaring me but than started to humor me. I really enjoyed how they had a special appearance from Erin Brokivich and included parts of the narrative film to help viewers get the idea of what they were saying. Although I did really enjoy this film, after seeing the solution they came up with to solve our problems... I feel that we are still hopeless. But the film itself was seriously wonderful and if this documentary isn't one of the most successful documentaries out there I will be extremely surprised. Way better than Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth and in my opinion even more affective than food inc.