Growing Rural Opportunities (GRO), a nonprofit organization that serves farmers in Polk County, proudly presents Farm Films: An Outdoor Movie Screening Series. On three occasions this summer, GRO will host screenings of agriculture-related films at outdoor locations throughout Polk County.  These events are free and open to the public thanks to a Community Matters grant from the Polk County Community Foundation. Come enjoy free refreshments, meet local Polk County farmers, and watch movies under the stars.

To kick off the event series, GRO will be screening “SEED: The Untold Story” on Friday, June 16 at Harmon Field in Tryon. In the last century, 94 percent of seed varieties have disappeared. As biotech chemical companies control the majority of seeds, farmers, scientists, lawyers and indigenous seed keepers fight to defend the future of food. This award winning documentary follows some of the passionate seed keepers who are protecting our 12,000 year-old food legacy.   

The second film to be featured in this event series is “The Greenhorns: A Documentary Film by for and about Young Farmers in America.” Today’s young farmers are dynamic entrepreneurs, stewards of place. They are involved in local politics, partnering with others, inventing new social institutions, working with mentors, starting their careers as apprentices, borrowing money from the bank, putting in long hours, taking risks, innovating, experimenting. These young farmers have vision: a prosperous, satisfying, sustainable food system. This film will be screened on Friday, July 7 at Stearns Park in Columbus and focuses on the growing movement of young people going back to the land.

To close out the series, GRO will screen “Look and See: A Portrait of Wendell Berry​”. ​Berry’s lifelong relationship with the land and community has come to form the core of his prolific writings.  In the span of a generation, the agrarian virtues of simplicity, land stewardship, sustainable farming, local economies and rootedness to place have been replaced by a capital intensive-model of industrial agriculture characterized by machine labor, chemical fertilizers, soil erosion and debt – all of which have frayed the fabric of rural communities.  Filmed across four seasons in the farming cycle, Look and See blends observational scenes of farming life, interviews with farmers and community members with evocative, carefully framed shots of the surrounding landscape in Henry County, Ky.  This event will be held on Friday, August 4 at the Mill Spring Ag Center in Mill Spring.

Film viewings will begin at 8:30 p.m. for each event and attendees are encouraged to arrive early with blankets or chairs. Events will be held indoors at the Mill Spring Ag Center in the case of inclement weather. For more information, visit growrural.org or email Patrick McLendon at patrick@growrural.org.

Article submitted by Amy DeCamp