Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Highly charged, undeniably thought-provoking and ultimately upsetting, 17 Nov 2006
In a film that will make you angry and disheartened, director Chris Paine explores the ominous confluence of big business and government and their efforts to get rid of the electric car, which ten years ago, looked as though it was going to set the automotive world on fire.
The reasons behinds reasons for the electric car's disappearance include corporate collusion and greed, governmental spinelessness and oil company propaganda. This does documentary does an excellent job of laying out what actually happened.
When General Motors terminated all leases of its fleet of fast, sleek EV's - the vehicle was never made available for purchase - the company ended up sending them to the crusher as Honda, Toyota and Ford also would pull their fleets off the streets. Determined to find out who ultimately was responsible stopping production, Paine cleverly structures his movie like a murder mystery, lining up the list of suspects and then methodically going through them.
In addition to the car companies and obviously the oil companies, who have grown accustomed to selling nearly 3 billion gallons of gas a week, fingers are also are pointed at the California Air Resources Board, which backed off of its original Zero Emission Vehicle Mandate under pressure from the auto industry and the Bush Administration (go figure).
While Paine, himself a one-time EV1 lessee, is unabashedly partial to the promise of electric-car technology over petrol, he includes interviewees who don't even agree a crime ever occurred and they argue that there was just lack of demand which ended the scant supply. Of course, oil companies ran ads claiming that the electric car was an environmental hazard and the public was just too shortsighted to see through the lies.
Later, the oil companies and the car manufacturers bought the rights to the electric car battery technology. And as Paine gathers such converts as Tom Hanks, Mel Gibson, Peter Horton and Alexandra Paul who talk about the advantages of having the car and how great it actually was, we see the gradual collusion of corporate and government interests gradually unfold.
Who Killed the Electric Car? makes a compelling case that the current discussion of hydrogen cell technology, as the successor to the internal combustion engine, but the movie also makes the point that hydrogen technology isn't nearly as efficient as electrical technology. The hydrogen cell is still decades away from being perfected, whilst the electric car was close to being practical - the cars were actually on the road!
And although the film ends on an optimistic note - with the current popularity of hybrid vehicles - it's still upsetting to see all these new clean electric cars - a hope for the future - being crushed, mangled and shredded.
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5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Recommended, 17 Nov 2006
This film is a perfect companion piece to "An Inconvenient Truth" which, in a sense, presents audiences with a problem that "Who Killed the Electric Car?" offers a large part of the solution to. Paine's film looks at the rise and fall of California's ZEV (Zero Emission Vehicle) mandate which forced automakers to produce technologically advanced vehicles like the GM EV1. Anyone driving a hybrid today, or considering purchasing one, will readily see the tremedous debt owed to the pioneering advancements made in the EV1. Ultimately, the film's appeal extends well beyond the bounds of auto enthusiasts as the issues involved represent much of what is so topical today; high gas prices, pollution, and instability in the oil supplying nations. "Electric Car..." features a well rounded variety of interviews with engineers and scientists, automotive industry experts, the petroleum lobby, everyday drivers, and energy experts. It manages to be engrossing, entlightening, and surprisingly, quite fun at the right moments. Take a break from watching the price of oil skyrocket and watch this DVD!
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