Wisconsin Film Festival Wisconsin Film Festival sneak peek #2: Questionable products

Thanks to an abundance of places to sell their shit online, people feel comfortable hocking anything these days. But there’s not a lot of risk in selling crochet iPod Nano cases on Etsy. There’s a whole world of sketchy transactions taking place around the globe, and thanks to the efforts of these documentary filmmakers, Wisconsin Film Festival attendees will get a sneak peek of what it’s like to be a entrepreneur who’s willing to risk lives, exploit the weak, or do a little jail time in order to make a buck.

Made In India: March 31, 7:45 p.m. and April 2, 5:45 p.m., Play Circle Theater
Synopsis: Brian and Lisa Switzer have tried everything to have a child—except adoption, since those aren’t real babies—but when doctors determine that Lisa will never be able to bear a child of her own, the couple determines that a surrogate mother is their only hope. However, the $70,000 rental price of an American uterus convinces them to outsource their surrogacy to a mommy-for-hire in India. Director Rebecca Haimowitz films their story along with that of the surrogate mother Aaisia as they all navigate the murky international waters of “procreational tourism.”
How it fits: While the film is ostensibly the story of the Switzers and their little foreign-grown miracles, the core of the film revolves around a world of clinic administrators and middlemen that facilitate international surrogacy under minimal government oversight. The savings that make the Spitzers so happy don’t really come from a cheaper medical system in India; mostly, they seem to come out of the pockets of surrogate mothers like Aasia, who have little legal protection to ensure they are paid fairly for bearing the children of obnoxious, slightly racist Texans.
If you’re in the market for some shady merchandise, you’ll like this because: Thanks to the miracle of modern medicine, exploiting foreign labor to save a few pennies isn’t limited to discount clothing and electronics anymore.

Square Grouper: The Godfathers of Ganja: March 30, 6 p.m., Bartell Theatre and April 2, 9:15 a.m., Wisconsin Union Theatre
Synopsis: Filmmaker Billy Corben (who also directed Cocaine Cowboys) tells the stories of three Florida marijuana smuggling operations through archival news footage and a few interviews with smugglers themselves. Some of the offenders: The Zion Coptic Church transports tons of pot over from Jamaica to provide their congregation with “religious experiences,” and an entire backwater town in the Everglades turns to drug running to pay the bills when new regulations shut down its fishing business.
How it fits: The film itself really shines in the archive news footage—seeing reporters react to the claims of Coptic church members serves as an great contrast to the culture around pot today. A few of the interviews yield some tips and tricks for would-be smugglers—hint, hollow out a yacht and repaint the waterline so no one can tell its loaded with hundreds of bales of marijuana. But subjects ramble endlessly about how they were only busted by Feds because of government conspiracies, rather than the whole drug smuggling deal.
If you’re in the market for some shady merchandise, you might like this because: Drug smuggling is made so humdrum and dull by some of the stories in this documentary, it will make buying pot feel like picking up milk at the grocery store.