Today I’m going to highlight two great documentary films about electric cars. Who Killed the Electric Car (2006) and Revenge of the Electric Car (2011) were both directed by Chris Paine. Paine’s first documentary Who Killed the Electric Car examines the first electric car which were introduced in 1996 by G.M. and its ultimate demise in 2002 due to insufficient demand. Given the popularity of electric or hybrid cars now, it’s hard to think that they were once unpopular. Paine examines the failure of the electric in Who Killed the Electric Car to its vengeful return in Revenge of the Electric Car.
After the BP oil disaster in 2010, Chris Paine went on to co-founded CounterSpill, which aims at promoting awareness of non-renewable energy disasters around the world. The website is useful as it gives dates, types of disasters, fast facts, and follow-up articles from various news sites.
For more information on Revenge of the Electric Car, take a look at their website. In addition to film making and co-founding CounterSpill, Chris Paine was also featured on NPR’s Science Friday.
As always, I’m including a trailer to the film for your review. The first trailer below is for Who Killed the Electric Car (2006) followed by the trailer forĀ Revenge of the Electric Car (2011).