Comox United Church and the Comox Valley Unitarian Fellowship will present the inspirational film I Am by director Tom Shadyac on Friday, March 21 at 7 p.m.
Shadyac earned a big reputation and big money directing silly but very successful Hollywood movies, such as Ace Ventura and The Nutty Professor.
A head injury from a biking accident left him unable to work for months. When an unexpected recovery occurred, Shadyac decided to change his life and to use his film making skills to answer two simple, but profound questions: “What’s wrong with our world?” and “What can we do about it?”
Interviewing some of the world’s influential thinkers, including David Suzuki, Desmond Tutu, Howard Zinn, Noam Chomsky, Lynn McTaggart, Thom Hartmann, and Coleman Barks, Shadyac hears startling contradictions to our usual assumptions about human nature.
For example, Darwin talked far more about cooperation in nature than about survival of the fittest. Compassionate behaviour is instinctive and actually part of our DNA.
Greed in indigenous cultures was considered a mental illness. Major social changes in our society can occur when many ordinary people make simple changes in their behaviour.
In the film Shadyac reminds us of the immense transformation that peaceful protest has achieved in the last century. He asserts that love, compassion and community, the basis of most spiritual traditions, can also be the basis of great change, and that our own small efforts can make our world different.
The presentation will be at Comox United Church, 250 Beach Drive in Comox. There will be a small group discussion after the film for those who wish to stay and to discuss the film’s themes.
— Comox United Church