Country: United States of America
Year: 2008
Language: English
Runtime: 81 minutes
Director: Lisa Merton and Alan Dater

Taking Root tells the dramatic story of Kenyan Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Wangari Maathai whose simple act of planting trees grew into a nationwide movement to safeguard the environment, protect human rights, and defend democracy - a movement for which this charismatic woman became an iconic inspiration.

Planting trees for fuel, shade, and food is not something that anyone would imagine as the first step toward winning the Nobel Peace Prize. Yet with that simple act Wangari Maathai, a woman born in rural Kenya, started down the path that reclaimed her country’s land from 100 years of deforestation, provided new sources of food and income to rural communities, gave previously impoverished and powerless women a vital political role in their country, and ultimately helped to bring down Kenya's twenty-four-year dictatorship.

Through intimate conversations with Maathai, whose warm, powerful, and luminous presence imbues much of the film, Taking Root captures a world-view in which nothing is perceived as impossible, presenting an awe-inspiring profile of one woman's thirty-year journey of courage to protect the environment, ensure equality between men and women, defend human rights, and promote democracy--all sprouting from the achievable act of planting trees.