Roots & Hollers is a half-hour documentary film that traces the wild American ginseng trade from the rugged men who dig the elusive root in the mountains of Appalachia to ginseng shops in San Francisco’s Chinatown.
The film explores the challenges diggers face in eking out a living by trading the rare and valuable plant and reveals the unique intersection between Asian and American cultures that dates back to the early 18th Century.
Roots & Hollers is a collaborative project of Patrick Kollman and Thomas Gorman. We are producing it as our Master’s project thesis in the documentary film program at the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism.
Roots & Hollers will be released in May of 2011.
Check out our Kickstarter page!
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