Feature: Is the electric car really dead?

Written and directed by Chris Paine, a former EV1 owner, it delves into the many conspiracy theories surrounding the car's forced removal from America's streets. It has just opened in selected cinemas in the UK.

The film features contributions from scores of EV1 owners, industry commentators, engineers and others who worked with GM on the EV1 programme, but it has a clear bias against corporate America. It passes guilty verdicts on the oil companies, car companies, local and national government - and even goes so far as to point the finger at alternative technologies such as hydrogen fuel cells.

Consumers don't get off lightly either, with GM itself blaming the EV1's demise on lack of customer demand - although that's disputed by pro-EV1 activists. However, the biggest villain of the piece is the gas-guzzling SUV, or, more specifically, the US car industry's desire to keep profiting from selling big 4x4s rather than encouraging American drivers into cheap-to-run small cars - or 've-hi-cles' as Martin Sheen (freshly retired as the President in The West Wing) puts it in his voiceover.

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