I don’t know about you, but when I go to the movies, I’m programmed to buy popcorn and shovel it in my mouth for 96 minutes while being mindlessly entertained. It’s hard to stand at the ticket window in the rain, eyes gliding over all the glossy enticing pictures of explosions, car chases, chicks and Studly Do-rights and actually choose to spend hard-earned money on a documentary.

Get over it. Knowledge is power. Slack-jawed entertainment is just … well, slack-jawed entertainment.

Who Killed the Electric Car is one film with a who-dun-it murder title that’s a no-brainer. We all know it wasn’t “we the people” … the consumers of America. We all know it was “them” – corporate America. So why bother watching the film if we know all this already? Right. Ok. Knowledge is power.

In a straight-forward journalistic – yet very human - manner, director Chris Paine examines the facts. In 1990, in an attempt to reduce air pollution and give California voters a chance at a fresh breath of air, California regulators launched a zero emissions vehicle program. Under the program, two percent of all new cars sold had to be electric by 1998 and 10 percent by 2003. In response, General Motors (GM) produced the first modern-day commercially available electric car, the EV1. The car required no fuel and could be plugged in for recharging at home and at “battery parks” which were rapidly being built to service the dream.

The EV1 was a sexy little number. Of the 1,000 cars produced and leased, (no one was allowed to actually buy the car) the few people who got to drive them, including a number of celebrities like Tom Hanks and Mel Gibson, said they handled like a dream and were fast as the devil. The average driving range was around 120 miles per charge, perfect for city commuters.

But GM ran few ads promoting the vehicle. When asked, company spokespeople touted its shortcomings while ignoring its benefits. Finally, in 2002, with thousands of people in California on waiting lists for the car, GM pulled the plug due to “insufficient demand.” Other major car makers rapidly followed suit and ceased production of their electric vehicles. Despite protest rallies, petitions and law suits, GM called-in the leases, literally prying people’s fingers off the steering wheels of their precious EV1s. The cars, again, amidst a flurry of public protests, were all hauled away and crushed.

Leave no body behind is always the ideal where murder is concerned. And if it weren’t for exposés like Who Killed the Electric Car, the suspects – namely GM, other car manufacturers, the oil industry, the hydrogen (read oil) industry, the California Air Regulation Board (CARB) and other political self-interests – might have gotten away with it.

Go see this movie, and the next time you hop in your Toyota Prius and think it’s so hot, you’ll realize what a political compromise and poor substitute you’re driving. We have the technology for high performance clean cars. Go to your auto dealerships, write your Congressmen and women. Demand them.