Daniel Straub
Directing
Biography
Daniel (he/him) is a Los Angeles based director and producer who has worked in documentary for more than 10 years. With a sharp eye for stories that give form to environmental racism, injustice in the health care system and other insidious issues, Straub has dedicated his career to using film and television as a vehicle for driving systemic change.
Known For
From the Los Angeles Times and Pulitzer Prize-finalist Rosanna Xia, OUT OF PLAIN SIGHT is a cinematic exposé of an environmental disaster lurking just off the coast of Southern California. Not far from Catalina Island, aboard one of the most-advanced research ships in the world, David Valentine discovered a corroded barrel on the seafloor that gave him chills. The full environmental horror sharpens into greater clarity once he calls Xia, who pieces together a shocking revelation: In the years after World War II, as many as half a million barrels of toxic waste had been quietly dumped into the ocean – and the consequences continue to haunt the world today.
Out of Plain Sight
The untold story of the most contaminated place in America and the people who live there. Running through St. James, Louisiana, there is an 85-mile industrial corridor, commonly known as “Cancer Alley” — home to some of the largest petrochemical plants in the country. The ones who cannot leave are anywhere between 50 to 500 times more likely to get cancer than the average American.
Cancer Alley
A Lake of the Isles homeowner and a Minneapolis chainsaw sculptor shape meaning (and a twenty foot tall pencil) from the twisted trunk of a fallen oak tree. But this pencil isn’t meant to last. Every year, thousands gather to sacrifice a part of the pencil in a sharpening ceremony, and in the process renew the collective promise to “do something.”