Bad waters, the story of the lawyer who challenged a multinational company that polluted the water

Bad waters is the film that airs tonight, in the late evening, at 23.26 on Iris. It is a film based on a true story directed by Todd Haynesabout a lawyer who fought a company responsible for polluting the water system in Parkersburg, West Virginia.

Bad waters, the plot

Released in Italy in 2020, shortly before the general closure due to the pandemic, Bad waters tells the story of attorney Robert Bilott (Mark Ruffalo) who becomes involved with an old acquaintance, Wilbur Tennant (Bill Camp) in a lawsuit that kicks off when Wilbur presents video evidence that as many as 190 cows died, not of natural causes. At first the lawyer does not accept the case, taken as it is by many work commitments. But when Robert goes to his hometown, Parksburg in West Virginia, Wilbur finally manages to show him the footage that would demonstrate the death of the animals due to a disease that Wilbur believes to be a consequence of the actions carried out by DuPont, a local multinational . A very hard job will then begin for the lawyer, aimed at bringing to light the truth about the contamination of the local water system which endangers the lives of many farmers in the area. And not only.

The real story behind the movie

The trend of the seventh art industry to bring true stories to the big screen that almost symbolize the biblical struggle between David and Goliath is certainly not new. Stories in which a handful of more or less ordinary men are brought before the eyes of justice to put a stop to the abuses perpetrated by large companies. Kind of what you saw, for example, in Erin Brokovich. Todd Haynes has decided to continue this narrative vein, telling a true story which, in American culture, has turned into the obsession of a lawyer against more than one multinational company which has revealed the limits of US public health and which emerged in 2016 thanks to a Article appeared on New York Times in which the work of was closely analysed Robert Bilott.

The story of this professional of the hole begins, according to the reconstruction made by The Guardianin 1998, when he was approached – just as seen in the film with Anne Hathaway

– by a farmer who was convinced that some of his animals had lost their lives due to an outflow of chemicals – known as PFOS extension And PFOA – present in the water system and caused by DuPont and Chemours Co, but also used by other companies. It’s about perfluoroalkyl substances and, specifically, of substances that do not exist in nature, but have been created by man and which are persistent, therefore they “last” for a long time after their production. Composed of carbon chains, these substances are used in many industrial fields, but many companies have stopped or modified their production precisely because of the dangers they could pose to health.

Bad waters therefore highlights a completely amoral and very serious behavior, which almost seems to recall what is seen in the dystopian filmV for Vendetta, when we also see a water system close to collapse due to water poisoning. There class action led by Robert Bilott counted thousands of people, whose health was equally at risk. Billott’s legal battle took about twenty years to reach its conclusion: a very hard job, which put the lawyer’s skills to the test, but also put the man’s career at risk. The reason why Billot accepted the case, to then deal with it as if it were the only fixed point of his existence, was told by the lawyer himself in the interview with The Guardian

in which he said: “It’s a threat to public health international. And it’s really frustrating when you take a step back and see how the science has become clearer about how dangerous these chemicals can be and, at the same time, how widespread their use is. The companies knew that if they used these substances they would end up in our waters, in our soil, in our land, inside us. And they did it anyway.” Robert Bilott’s legal struggle was later recounted by the lawyer himself in the book entitled Exposure: Poisoned Water, Corporate Greed, and One Lawyer’s Twenty-Year Battle against DuPont.