Directed by Maggie Burnette Stogner | 2020 | United States | 30 mins
Unbreathable: The Fight for Healthy Air spotlights the ongoing struggle for clean air in the United States. Over the past fifty years, there has been major progress in significantly reducing air pollution across the nation thanks to the Clean Air Act. However, asthma continues to be the number one health issue for children and nearly half of all Americans across the country today are still impacted by unhealthy levels of air pollution. This 30-minute film shares stories of communities that are fighting for healthier air and the challenges we face to ensure healthy air for all.
Directed by award-winning filmmaker Maggie Burnette Stogner. Produced by Elizabeth Herzfeldt-Kamprath. Executive Produced by the Center for Environmental Filmmaking at American University, with support from the American Lung Association, AU’s Center for Environmental Policy, and the Hanley Foundation.
Review quotes
"Maggie Stogner's film Unbreathable traces the history—and mixed successes—of the Clean Air Act, showing that this legal framework still has not addressed the racially disparate nature of air pollution.
The case study on Louisiana's Cancer Alley focusing on the role of the state's powerful oil and gas industry in thwarting the implementation of clean air standards, and effects on low-income Black residents, was especially instructive as a teaching tool for my course on Environmental Justice." - Dr. Malini Ranganathan, Associate Professor and Interim Director, Antiracist Research and Policy Center American University, Washington, DC
A powerful and important film about one of modern America’s most consequential laws.” - Beth Gardiner, Author of Choked
Quotes from the film
“If it's about you, your family, your kids, you will demand that the federal government stand up” - Gina McCarthy EPA Administrator (2013-2017)
Whenever there were efforts to change, roll back, stop advances or environmental protection, it has been the health issue that has rallied people” - Mary Nichols, Chair of California air resources board
Where the Clean Air act has done a lot of good to a lot of people, but it is not equal in terms of how people have benefited, and that's the undone business for the Clean Air Act” - Myron Arnowitt, Clean Water Action
In order for a law like the Clean Air Act to work, it takes government at the federal and state level, it takes business and industry throughout the country, and it takes citizens pushing in the right direction” - Henry Waxman, U.S. House of Representatives, 1975-2015
When we come together, we can win. There is no problem that's bigger than us, because when we all come together, we’re pretty big” - Shashawna Campbell, Free your Voice