Documentary film fans were in for a real treat over the weekend in Grand Forks. No Boundaries Film Club presented 17 documentary films over three days as part of the Traveling World Community Film Festival at Grand Forks Secondary School.The films ranged from When Bubbles Burst from director Hans Petter Moland about the mechanics behind economic bubbles and crashes; to GROW!, from Anthony Masterson, about idealistic young farmers who have turned to the fields for a more fulfilling life, driven by a desire to grow and distribute food locally and in a more sustainable manner; to Bear Witness, by B.C.’s coastal First Nations about animals and people trying to adapt to less fish and smaller trees.The film I am going to review is The Light Bulb Conspiracy from director Cosima Dannortizer about how planned obsolence has shaped people’s lives and the economy since the 1920s when manufacturers deliberately started shortening the life of consumer products to increase demand.The film begins with a young Swedish man who has a problem with his printer. Every store he takes it to recommends that he simply buy a new printer. But he is determined to see if he can fix the printer.The first part of the film explains the titular conspiracy. There was a time when light bulbs ran for an average of 2,500 and even more hours before replacing. A group (the ‘cartel’) of light bulb manufacturers got together in the 1920s and decided that in order to sell more light bulbs, they would dictate how long a light bulb would last and that would be no more than 1,000 hours. That, as the movie explains, is the essence behind “planned obsolence.” In our throw-away society, people buy something, use it up quickly and get the next newer, better model.I can tell you from personal experience trying to help my mom replace her printer ink cartridges, how wide-spread this theory is. My mom’s current printer probably cost $100 and was pretty nice. To replace the ink cartridges, which maybe last a year if used regularly, the cost would be about $70. Plus you have to know how to replace the cartridges and hope not to get ink all over you.I found quickly that I could buy her a new, and better, printer for about $30 or $40. So that’s what we did, and now she has a great big old printer that we’ll have to drag out to the dump or the e-cycling station at some point.As the film points out, we use and discard; The economy relies on it.Building more printers, or phones or jeans or whatever, creates jobs and thus boosts the economy.The shorter the life of the product, the better.Building a product that doesn’t fail is inevitable bad.The film used archival footage and interviews with various experts and politicians to hammer home the points.Also touched on, was the original unreplaceable iPod battery which was made by design to last a year and a half before stopping. Thus ensuring customers had to essentially buy a new iPod every year and a half.The Lightbulb Conspiracy also talked about how all the product waste inevitably leads to excess garbage which has to go somewhere. “Infinite growth vs. finite resources.”The film wraps around with the Swedish fellow finding a fix on the internet for his printer problem.In all, I found the Lightbulb Conspiracy to be interesting and engaging. Everyone is a consumer and I’m sure most of us have wondered why some products don’t last longer.Like most documentaries, The Lightbulb Conspiracy doesn’t offer any easy answers but merely presents questions.

Grand Forks Gazette