The Journal News, November 22, 2009
Can capitalism save the world?

Brian J. Howard

With the government poised to reform one-sixth of the U.S. economy and bankers and auto workers owing their industries' survival to federal intervention, a Yorktown filmmaker and his partners thought it was a good time for an in-depth study of entrepreneurial capitalism.

Timing, they say, isn't everything. Good ideas are, though.

"The New Recruits," by Garrison-based Ironbound Films, followed three business school grads on their respective missions to unleash free market innovation on extreme poverty.

"They use businesses to create charitable solutions," said Jeremy Newberger, 36, of Yorktown. "It's creating a sustainable solution to a problem that's usually solved or not solved by charity."

Newberger describes the film as "The Apprentice meets Slumdog Millionaire." Partner and Ironbound co-founder and Cold Spring resident Daniel A. Miller thinks the timing is just right for pondering such ideas.

"I think what's interesting is capitalism is getting such a bad rap lately," Miller said. "What does this new movement mean? Is it working? Can it possibly work?"

Along with Seth Kramer of Red Hook, who rounds out the trio, they met at their Garrison Landing offices — in a historic building steps from the Metro-North rail line — and discussed the film they spent much of the last three years making.

As businessmen themselves, they were already receptive to its premise that entrepreneurship can be a means of economic development.

But the film aims more to give the idea an honest airing — brutally honest, at times — than advancing any ideological notions.

"If you want that, you'll see a Michael Moore film," said Kramer, who calls himself the most left-leaning of the three, politically. "I was raised by socialists and communists," he joked.

Added Newberger, "What's cool about the subject is it appeals to both sides."

The projects that are highlighted in the film are not your typical start-up ventures. Essentially fish-out-of-water stories, they depict individuals who are unprepared for what they face.

One subject heads to Nairobi to help market environmentally responsible sanitation and housing projects, including one product dubbed the Eco-toilet. Another goes to India to develop business strategies for a firm that uses light-emitting diode technology as an alternative to kerosene lanterns.

The last, Joel Montgomery of Alabama, leaves his megachurch behind and finds himself in Pakistan, trying to sell drip irrigation systems to farmers who have relied on the inefficient but age-old practice of flooding their fields.

"Joel's faith in God is matched only by his faith in the free market, and both sort of crumple in Pakistan," Kramer said.

Narrating the film is Rainn Wilson, co-star of NBC's "The Office." A comic actor with a bent for philanthropy, Wilson entered the filmmakers' radar by way of his quirky, spiritualistic Web site, soulpancake.com, and his busy Twitter feed.

Wilson's "Office" character, Dwight Schrute, epitomizes the self-interest negatively associated with capitalism, so he seemed a perfect spokesman for its potential social benefits.

"We were all there at the sound recording, afraid to say, 'Be more like Dwight,' " Miller said.

Wilson left for a charitable trip to Haiti a few days later. But when he Tweeted about the film, Ironbound's Web site was inundated with traffic.

Their last film, "The Linguists," about dying languages, premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2008. Supported by PBS, the film will also air in edited form on the network in 2010.

For all its seriousness, it is still a movie and has to tell a compelling tale to win over audiences.

Its creators are confident that it will, while holding appeal across the political spectrum.

"It's sort of a global adventure story," Miller said. "It's got enough in it to piss off the right and the left, but it will also energize them."