People who know me lovingly call me a hippy. Liberal attitude, raggedy clothes, easy-going, play by ear attitude, and my passionate love for rock, I don't like the tag of "hippy", but I'd consider myself one in nature, so it saddens me when we watch a bunch of people proclaim their love for nature and act like--what's the word--? Nuts? Here we have Julia Hill, an activist from the group "The Earth Firsters" a group of hippies and bohemians (read elitists), who sing and dance and voice their opinions on nature talking about it like their mistress who just bedded them, but they never do contribute anything as a "society".

They don't sign petitions, make speeches at congress or appeal to people in a sensible manner, they don't hand out fliers, don't try to get the tree certified as a historical landmark, nor do they host parties or benefits to voice their thoughts, they don't petition the company (only depict their workers as dastardly villains) they never do anything but sing and dance and chant and talk about nature like it gave them the best sex of their life. Well, that's good and all, but do something useful to plead your cause and maybe you'd be taken seriously. We clearly see a documentary meant to worship this group rather than give a real opinion about the issue at hand, logging! Remember Doug Wolens (Director)?

We see obvious tinkering with the protestors shown amidst green sprawling trees, talking with such relaxation and passive aggressiveness, and ease and theme music like awful folk songs, one really bad one devoted to Julia. Julia is described as "magical", and a "Patriot" at one point, attempting to further elevate her beyond the thought of a mere nut job sitting in a tree. The people against it are shown in cold city areas, in their lavish homes without theme music, and all they do is rant angrily in an irate tone. See where they're going with this? Hey, I love nature, I hate what it offers like mosquitoes, and poison oak, but I'm as liberal as the next guy (I'm no conservative), and I like trees, I got nothing against trees, but do these people ever think that maybe they're stopping these people from making a living, and halting the economy in their small town?

People were losing their jobs, experiencing cutbacks, possibly losing their homes, ruining the economy of their town which they claim to cherish, and depict these people as enemies when really it's just guys trying to make a living and money. That, in turn, is selfish and basically they contradict their own cause by this vain protest. Julia "Butterfly" Hill is an activist who lived on a 200 foot tall ancient redwood tree named Luna (in a tree house built from wood!), from December 10, 1997 to December 18, 1999, above the town of Stafford California near San Francisco.

"Butterfly" pulls off the task of making her look like a hero, it does that, but there's a thought that eventually enters the back of your head, you eventually can't help wondering if Julia "Butterfly" is doing this protest because she really believes in the cause of preserving a tree, or because she just wants to be known as a patriot and deity in the protest world. Julia is surely such a presence in the movie, a vain, delusional, ego-maniacal, pretentious, self-righteous presence which is demonstrated in one dreadful scene where she boasts about herself as a god and a superhuman and brags about having to turn away news programs.

My question: Why aren't all the people in the group living in all the trees in the forest? Don't they want the entire forest to be kept from being ruined? And they use phones, have plastic seals on Julia's little tree house, wear cotton, read books, use paper stationary, wear paper hats, most likely pounded nails into the tree to build the house (poor Luna!), use steel, use deodorant and shampoo (that's an assumption), use gas stoves, and they say they want a tree to be preserved. Well, look for the term "bleeding heart" in the dictionary and you'll find an ad for the "Earth First-ers".

One member even offers an astute description about the Earth-Firsters: "We're strategically acute as the wind"... yeah, okay... I think I understand now... you're loonies! Is it looney to believe in something or want to preserve a tree? No, it's admirable, is it looney to name a tree and caress it in a near orgasmic gaze? Yes. Trees have no feeling people, they're tools of nature, not living entities... but we have to save the shovels... they really feel pain!

They never give tolerable reasons nor do they plead their case, they only continue ranting on about nature like it's their mom, and continue spouting "love" in every other word showing no real basis for argument giving rebuttals that are more like assumptions and rash generalization than cold hard fact, and most of the members look high. Nothing medication won't fix. One representative even looks eerily like Charles Manson which didn't convince me to buy their cause (Hums "Helter Skelter")... I got blisters on my fingers! It's just really hard to take this group seriously when they're banging drums and hom-ing in monotonous tones at a tree, a scene that really reminded me of "Wicker Man". Eery.

Crafty camera work, editing, lighting and theme music make this left-angled documentary more than it is, depicting a group of oddballs fighting for a tree from a wicked logging company, but the fact these people never make relevant arguments, never act like real activists but like loons does not help their case, and their mission set here never convinces us that what they're doing is right. This is really dumb.

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