OLIVE - 12 min

“Olive” is a short documentary that follows Olive Hagemeier, an energetic woman, on her daily routine of salvaging, repackaging and redistributing food, and occasional other types of “waste”, across Atlanta, GA. Presented in a quiet observational style, this film is both a character study of a committed and enigmatic volunteer, as well as an ethnographic work that places the audience in the heart of a decentralized, volunteer-run mutual aid network in a “post-COVID” American city.

SCREENINGS

Atlanta Film Festival (2024), Nitehawk Short Film Festival (2024), Cucalorus Film Festival (2023), Tacoma Film Festival (2023)

Filmed over the course of 3 days, and edited chronologically, there is always a sense of motion even in stillness. Olive is always on the move - whether she’s picking up leftover food or baked goods from a restaurant before it closes, repackaging and labeling the food for evening redistribution, or driving from place to place. Her active participation in the different facets of the mutual aid network reveals glimpses of its sprawling intersections, but does not try to give a comprehensive description to how the entire system operates. Instead the film is happy to let the audience into an unfamiliar world, and inspire curiosity about its details. Where did the communal fridge come from? How many people participate in picking up and dropping off food throughout the day? How many people rely on these services? Does such a network exist in my own community?

The film as a character study is a meditation on how a life lived in service of others can be a source of laughter, joy, community and youthful energy.