2021 started with a bang, with a dizzying nearly half a million people signing up for Veganuary. 

Throughout the year, plant-based meat companies forged partnerships with the biggest names in the food industry, like McDonald’s, Subway, and Dominos, to name a few. 

A host of high-profile names spoke out about animal exploitation, including Grammy Award-winner Billie Eilish and Formula 1 champion Lewis Hamilton, who are both vegan.

Corporations shelled out millions of dollars to place behind alternative protein start-ups, and communities around the globe rallied together to help protect the planet from the climate emergency. 

Klaus Mitchell, director of the PBN annual film series and founder of PBN, said the new short film arrived at just the right time. 

He explained: “More people than ever are paying attention to the vegan movement, and VEGAN 2021 highlights why.

“This short film sheds light on the growing awareness of plant-based living, and why picking up the lifestyle is easier, simpler, and more important than ever before.”

Check out Plant Based News’ YouTube channel for more videos like this.

The post WATCH: PBN’s Annual Short Film ‘Vegan 2021’ appeared first on Plant Based News.

“I have spent the last three years investigating animal skins in fashion,” Cappelli says in the film’s trailer. “They have a damaging impact on the planet, on people, and, of course, on the animals.”

“If someone would have told me even half of what I discovered doing this film, I wouldn’t have believed them.”

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Cruelty in fashion

More brands are banning animal skins (fur bans, in particular, have become popular among luxury brands, as public opinion turns on the trade), but fashion is still far from cruelty-free. 

According to the documentary, around 2.5 billion animals are killed for fashion every year. Around 1.4 billion of those in the leather industry. (Leather isn’t limited to cows; pigs, kangaroos, buffalo, alligators, and snakes are also killed for their skins.)

But Cappelli hopes that her film will drive change.

SLAY’s Indiegogo page, which hopes to raise almost £50,000 to promote the film, reads: “Through our collective efforts, films like Cowspiracy and What the Health have had a huge global impact – and we can do this again.”

“We want this film to reach a mainstream audience to accelerate change thanks to existing solutions.”

Innovation in fashion is improving, and the plant-based leather industry, in particular, is becoming more mainstream.

For example, in 2021, Game of Thrones star Maisie Williams teamed up with Coperni to design a range of bags made from apple leather. Also last year, Ganni pledged to ditch leather completely, and instead use grape-based leather to make its shoes.

At the time, the brand’s founder Nicolaj Reffstrup said: “Selling leather products, although highly profitable, will soon be as outdated as smoking on TV.”

SLAY wants to make that prediction come true as soon as possible. Click here to find out more about the project, and donate to its fundraiser.

The post New Documentary ‘SLAY’ Exposes Fashion’s Cruel Animal Skin Trade appeared first on Plant Based News.

Newkirk is the founder and president of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA).

Published in 1992, Newkirk wrote Free the Animals about the Animal Liberation Front (an international, leaderless movement that promotes non-violent action against animal cruelty).

The plot of Free the Animals sees a character named Valerie challenge the system, and her work as a police officer, after learning about the abuse of animals in laboratories. To celebrate the 30-year anniversary of its publication, a new edition of the book is out this month. It features a foreword from Phoenix himself.

“Yes, ‘Free the Animals’ is about the balaclava-wearing heroes who break windows and laws to save animals, but it’s also about everyone. It’s a call to us all to take action,” writes Phoenix.

“Whether it’s wielding crowbars and bolt-cutters or picking up a pen or a protest sign, every one of us can and must fight injustice and push for animal liberation every chance we get.”

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Joaquin Phoenix and animal rights

Phoenix consistently gives a platform to animal rights messaging. In his 2020 Oscar acceptance speech, he said that humans have become “disconnected from the natural world.”

He added that “many of us are guilty of an egocentric worldview.”

“We feel entitled to artificially inseminate a cow and steal her baby, even though her cries of anguish are unmistakable. Then we take her milk that’s intended for her calf and we put it in our coffee and our cereal.”

A few days later, the actor rescued a mother cow and her calf from a slaughterhouse.

Newkirk says that other high-profile celebrities have expressed interest in acquiring the movie rights to Free the Animals.

She chose Phoenix because of his long-term commitment to animal rights activism.

“Joaquin understands what animals go through and lives and breathes animal rights,” she told the Hollywood Reporter. “It’s part of his very being.”

The post Joaquin Phoenix Acquires Film Rights To Animal Liberation Book appeared first on Plant Based News.

It seems like an unlikely event. But Stacy isn’t alone. In 2017, a cow in Poland rammed a fence and swam away to an island. In 2021, a cow in Brazil escaped a slaughterhouse and ended up in a water park. All of the escapees were spared from slaughter.

Now, production company Antimae Film wants to bring the story of a runaway cow to the big screen in a new live-action called Matilda.

Directed by Marc Pierschel (who also directed award-winning Butenland and The End of Meat), Matilda is set in England. It follows the story of a young aspiring chef named Anna who stumbles across an escaped cow (Matilda) in the forest and joins together with animal rights activists to fight for her rescue.

A key problem for Anna, however, is her meat-eating family, and her relationship with her father, who works in a slaughterhouse.

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Call for Kickstarter funding

“Matilda is a film that moves between resignation and activism,” says producer Steffi Koehler in a video on Kickstarter. “Anna takes us on a journey through the emotional worlds of a young woman who assumes responsibility for another living being.”

“Matilda creates new role models and shows a different perspective on our treatment of animals, our environment, and empowerment.”

Antimae Film hopes to start production on the film next year and is aiming for a 2024 world premiere. 

But to bring this poignant, hard-hitting, and thought-provoking story to life, Antimae Film needs funding. Right now, it has raised more than £21,000, but it must hit a target of more than £42,000.

Click here to find the Kickstarter for the project. Those who pledge money can access a variety of awards, including a co-producer credit.

The post Feature Film ‘Matilda’ Tells The Story Of A Runaway Factory Farm Cow appeared first on Plant Based News.

Inspiring people to take the climate crisis seriously

The actor is passionate about fighting the climate crisis. He has created his own documentaries to raise awareness of global warming, like 2016’s Before the Flood. He frequently invests in sustainable, plant-based brands (vegan snack company Hippeas, for example). Plus, he uses his platform to advocate for climate action.

In 2016, DiCaprio received the Academy Award for Best Actor in The Revenant. In his acceptance speech, DiCaprio spoke of the need to take climate crisis action seriously. The next day, Google searches for “climate change” rose 261 percent.

Using the power of cinematography combined with harrowing testimonials (including the perspectives of indigenous people who live in some of the most climate crisis-impacted areas of the world), Eating Our Way to Extinction intends to have a similar effect on viewers.

Last year, director Otto Brockway and producer Mark Galvin told Plant Based News: “Most of the modern world has somewhat lost that connection to nature and to the planet in some way.”

“[Indigenous] people very much still live in tune with nature and they see the cycles of the Earth and the cycles around them that have been relatively stable for hundreds and maybe even thousands of years – suddenly changing.”

Among other issues, the hard-hitting documentary focuses on ocean dead zones, greenhouse gasses, deforestation, species extinction, and plastic pollution, all of which can be tied back to animal agriculture.

Eating Our Way to Extinction is available to stream on Prime Video.

The post Leonardo DiCaprio Encourages 53 Million Followers To Watch This Climate Crisis Documentary appeared first on Plant Based News.

Years in the making, the feature-length film dives deep into the darkest corners of the dairy industry, in an attempt to uproot the picture-perfect narrative carefully constructed by animal agriculture’s largest organizations.

In MILKED, activist Chris Huriwai travels Aotearoa (the Māori name for New Zealand), speaking to experts in medicine, ecology, politics, and business in search of answers.

“We originally planned to investigate the environmental and health impacts of all animal agriculture in Aotearoa. But once we got further into researching, it was obvious that dairy was the story to tell,” MILKED director and producer Amy Taylor said. 

And that story isn’t as idyllic as it’s often made out to be. Alongside disturbing animal welfare violations, the dairy industry is to blame for excessive water and land use, pollution, and greenhouse gas emissions, the film explains.

That’s part of the reason why the team behind MILKED launched a petition alongside the film’s release. The petition urges for a global reduction in dairy herds – by at least 25 percent – over the next three years.

There are four variations of the petition: one each for the United Kingdom, the United States, Europe, and New Zealand. Those interested can sign the petition(s) here.

MILKED the film

With input from the likes of Dame Jane Goodall, Suzy Amis Cameron, and Keegan Kuhn – and supported by Academy Award-winning director James Cameron – MILKED had people talking weeks before its release.

When the documentary creators launched a crowdfunding campaign to help get the concept off the ground, it took just 12 days for contributors to put forward $NZD100,000.

As a result, the team upped the goal by $20,000, with plans to use the funds for the film’s production itself, but also activist campaigns aimed at raising awareness of the dairy sector’s environmental impact.

The funding will also go towards government lobbying initiatives, and will provide financial support for farmers exiting the dairy industry in favor of animal-free work.

“We’re so grateful for the incredible support we’ve already received from around the world,” Taylor commented. “It shows how many people are passionate about exposing the truth about the dairy industry, and looking at a better way forward.”

Watch MILKED for free on YouTube here

The post MILKED The Documentary Is Finally Here, And The Dairy Industry Might Not Like It appeared first on Plant Based News.

MILKED – which will soon be available to watch via Plant Based News – takes a deep dive into the dairy sector of Aotearoa (the Māori name for New Zealand). The country is the largest exporter of dairy in the world.

Alongside the film’s premiere, the creators of MILKED have published four variations of a petition that aims to reduce global dairy herds by 25 percent in next three years. 

The petitions – aimed at the UK, the US, Europe, and New Zealand – are directed at each country’s leaders. MILKED hopes that global collective efforts can help create a more sustainable food system. And, one that protects the lives of millions of animals too.

The problem with dairy

MILKED acknowledges that the dairy industry is widely considered a “source of national pride.”

But behind the curtain, the industry is said to be damaging the country more than benefiting it.

The dairy sector is Aotearoa’s largest water polluter. And it doesn’t just pollute water, it uses excessive amounts of it too. According to MILKED, 1,000 liters of water is required to produce just one liter of cow’s milk.

Plant-based alternatives are often a different story. Oat milk, for example, uses 13 times less water and 11 times less land than cow’s milk, the organization says.

Further, oat milk generates 3.5 times fewer carbon emissions. New Zealand’s dairy industry is currently producing almost a quarter of the country’s total greenhouse gas emissions on its own. Although MILKED calls this figure a “conservative estimate.”

Perhaps more conceringly, the country’s largest dairy company, Fonterra, is projected to exceed New Zealand’s total national emissions target in the coming decade.

Filmmakers discovered that Fonterra – which initially agreed to an interview but then pulled out – has been underreporting its environmental data. 

In one case, Fonterra reported 22 million tons of emission output, when the actual figure was double that. In total, the dairy company is to blame for more emissions than the whole of Sweden. 

MILKED stresses that despite industry efforts to sequester carbon, this does not address the expulsion of methane from cows. Notably, methane is 84 times more potent than carbon dioxide. 

MILKED the documentary

The new film brings such statistics to light through interviews with high-profile figures like Dame Jane Goodall, environmentalist and actor Suzy Amis Cameron, and Cowspiracy co-director Keegan Kuhn. Academy Award-winning director James Cameron has labeled the film a “powerful wake-up call.”

During MILKED, filmmakers follow activist Chris Huriwai around the country as he speaks with experts in ecology, medicine, and economy, as well as local dairy farmers. 

Aside from sustainability concerns, Huriwai takes a closer look at the ethical, animal welfare, and health implications of dairy consumption. 

“We originally planned to investigate the environmental and health impacts of all animal agriculture in Aotearoa. But once we got further into researching, it was obvious that dairy was the story to tell,” MILKED director and producer Amy Taylor explained. 

Inviting the public to help bolster the documentary’s message, MILKED launched a crowdfunding campaign with a goal of $NZD100,000. Contributors helped the organization exceed the figure in just 12 days, motivating MILKED to extend the funding goal.

Those interested can sign MILKED’s petition to reduce global dairy herds here.

MILKED will be available to watch on Plant Based News‘ YouTube channel from March 25, 2022 at 7pm (GMT), or March 26 from 8am (NZDT).

To learn more about MILKED, check out its website.

The post New Documentary ‘MILKED’ Launches Global Petitions To Dismantle Dairy Industry appeared first on Plant Based News.

In response, the team behind the movie have increased their goal by $20,000 to help amplify the message further. Additionally, an anonymous donor has committed to matching funds up to $100,000. So, every dollar donated so far will be doubled.

James Cameron: a ‘wake-up call’

MILKED pulls back the curtain on Aotearoa’s (the Māori name for New Zealand) dairy industry. The country is the largest exporter of dairy in the world. 

The film includes interviews from the likes of renowned ethologist Dame Jane Goodall and Cowspiracy co-director Keegan Kuhn. Environmentalist and actor Suzy Amis Cameron also features in the movie.

Cameron’s partner, Academy Award-winning director James Cameron, has placed his support behind the project too. He said the film is a “powerful wake-up call that the world is getting MILKED.”

MILKED documentary

The movie follows activist Chris Huriwai as he travels the country to learn more about the industry. There, Huriwai speaks directly to dairy farmers as well as experts in the fields of medicine, economy, ecology, and politics. 

“We originally planned to investigate the environmental and health impacts of all animal agriculture in Aotearoa. But once we got further into researching, it was obvious that dairy was the story to tell,” MILKED director and producer Amy Taylor said. 

“And with dairy giant Fonterra inviting Chris to meet with them and then backing out, we became even more curious about what was going on.”

Funding goals

The funds already raised by MILKED will go towards final edits, paying contractors and producers, and legal counsel. It will also help fund marketing, including media stunts like the recently erected billboards that “congratulate” the dairy industry on being Aotearoa’s largest polluter.

The crowdfunding earnings will also help create an educational version of the film. This copy will be distributed to various schools and universities.

Further, the money will help develop impact campaigns, including those supporting farmers who are transitioning out of the dairy industry. And, lobbying for the government to remove dairy from schools and nutritional guidelines in favor of a plant-based focus.

The stretch goal of $20,000 will be used to produce new content from the more than 100 hours of interviews conducted for MILKED. It will also go towards the production of a short film about a dairy farmer moving out of animal agriculture.

“We’re so grateful for the incredible support we’ve already received from around the world having only just launched our crowdfunding campaign,” said director Taylor. “It shows how many people are passionate about exposing the truth about the dairy industry, and looking at a better way forward.”

The film drops on March 18 via WaterBear, the first free streaming network “dedicated to the future of our planet,” and will be hosted for free on Plant Based News from March 26.

Those interested in contributing to the crowdfunding campaign can do so here. To visit MILKED’s website, see here.

The post New Documentary MILKED To Expose Dairy Industry After Eclipsing $100k Fundraising Goal appeared first on Plant Based News.

2021 started with a bang, with a dizzying nearly half a million people signing up for Veganuary. 

Throughout the year, plant-based meat companies forged partnerships with the biggest names in the food industry, like McDonald’s, Subway, and Dominos, to name a few. 

A host of high-profile names spoke out about animal exploitation, including Grammy Award-winner Billie Eilish and Formula 1 champion Lewis Hamilton, who are both vegan.

Corporations shelled out millions of dollars to place behind alternative protein start-ups, and communities around the globe rallied together to help protect the planet from the climate emergency. 

A ‘worldwide shift’

PBN’s last yearly recap, VEGAN 2020, was feature length and garnered nearly 700,000 views. 

This year’s highly anticipated release is a short film, and will be hosted on shorter video platforms such as Instagram and Facebook, as well as YouTube. 

Klaus Mitchell, director of the PBN annual film series and founder of PBN, said the new short film has arrived at just the right time. 

“More people than ever are paying attention to the vegan movement, and VEGAN 2021 highlights why. This short film sheds light on the growing awareness of plant-based living, and why picking up the lifestyle is easier, simpler, and more important than ever before,” he explained. 

Mitchell recently delivered a speech at Imperial College London, in which he explored the rapid acceleration of the plant-based movement. He also touched on the importance of technology, which he believes will “precipitate a worldwide shift away from industrial animal agriculture.” You can watch Mitchell’s speech below.

VEGAN 2021 was edited by Cameron Almeida and Jon Rogers. It was sponsored by PlantX, your “one-stop shop” for everything vegan – from food and groceries to indoor plants and even plant-based pet food – all from the comfort of your own home.

In support of the documentary, PlantX has given Plant Based News readers a 15 percent discount – so be sure to use the discount code PLANTXPBN2022 at checkout.

For PlantX’s US website, click here. For its Canadian website, see here. And for its UK website, head here.

The post PBN’s New Short Film ‘Vegan 2021’ Is Out Now appeared first on Plant Based News.

The 25-year-old actor, who plays Ned Leeds in the hit film, said he had a wake-up call since barely unable to walk up the stairs.

“This one day I saw myself without a shirt on, it was ridiculous,” Batalon told Men’s Health in a recent major interview.

‘Spider-Man’ star Jacob Batalon

Batalon rose to fame since securing his first Marvel role in Spiderman: Homecoming back in 2017.

Despite soaring success across a further three Avengers films, he had begun feeling tired on set.

So, amid his busy filming schedule, he spent 2020 transforming the old diet and exercise routines he had donned since childhood.

Batalon had reached a point where he had taken “a hard look” at himself.

“I could not believe I let myself get this far,” he explained.

Plant-based diet

The journey to losing over 100 pounds involved a rigorous exercise routine, coupled with a plant-based diet.

He revealed: “Recently, my girlfriend has actually gotten me into a plant-based diet, as well. And that’s really helped my body…

“I can feel the difference between eating a lot of meat and eating plant-based stuff and that’s really helped me.”

Now, Batalon trains in the gym six days a week, for more than an hour at a time.

“I found a lot of light in the dark in the sense that a lot of people were suffering. And, I was fortunate and lucky enough to have found my health and all those things,” he said.

The post ‘Spider-Man’ Star Jacob Batalon Sheds 112lbs On Plant-Based Diet appeared first on Plant Based News.