An Inconvenient Truth
by Danny Fisher
Today I went to see David Guggenheim’s new documentary An Inconvenient Truth. The film follows former Vice President Al Gore as he travels the world speaking before large groups about global warming with an extremely effective, state-of-the-art slideshow presentation.
As my friends well know, I’m something of a film buff. Cinematically speaking, I didn’t exactly think An Inconvenient Truth leapt off of the screen. And yet, it is a gripping and frightening–even emotional–experience. Considering this reaction, I think I have to dismiss most of my aesthetic critiques as relatively unimportant quibbles. Scott Tobias sums up the experience of watching the film very well in his review for The Onion A.V. Club:
- Essentially a traveling PowerPoint presentation on global warming by former Vice President Al Gore, it isn’t really much of a film–it lacks even the minor cinematic embellishments of comparable Spalding Gray monologue films like Swimming To Cambodia or Monster In A Box. As such, it seems better suited to classrooms than movie theaters, though any way its urgent message can be disseminated should be encouraged…[A]fter 100 minutes of level-headed elaboration, [An Inconvenient Truth is] chillingly undeniable.
As an at least adequately informed environmentalist, I didn’t go into this film needing to be convinced that humankind has become (as Vice President Gore describes it) “a force of nature,” dangerously encouraging and aggravating global warming with the unchecked effects of our industrial technology. Still, the film’s urgency and the harrowing information it holds moved me tremendously–I felt a renewed commitment to working for the health of the planet. It is an essential film, no matter how much or little you know about global warming.
An Inconvenient Truth may be, as the advertisements declare, “the most terrifying film you will ever see,” but there were also moments of surprising hope. In one scene, Vice President Gore talks about the kind of information scientists can glean by studying and even just looking at Antarctic ice. He recalls an experience with a scientist who showed him changes over time in the ice, pointing to one section of a sample and saying, “Here’s the Clean Air Act.” The effects of that important piece of legislation were marked in the ice! I found myself facetiously thinking, “If that doesn’t renew one’s faith in the political process, I don’t know what will.”
I strongly, strongly encourage you to see An Inconvenient Truth and to bring along friends and family. I don’t think the importance of this film can be overstated. As Pulitzer Prize-winning film critic Roger Ebert writes in his heartfelt, powerful, and quite eloquent four-star review of the film:
- I want to write this review so every reader will begin it and finish it. I am a liberal, but I do not intend this as a review reflecting any kind of politics. It reflects the truth as I understand it, and it represents, I believe, agreement among the world’s experts.
Global warming is real.
It is caused by human activity.
Mankind and its governments must begin immediate action to halt and reverse it.
If we do nothing, in about 10 years the planet may reach a “tipping point” and begin a slide toward destruction of our civilization and most of the other species on this planet.
After that point is reached, it would be too late for any action.
These facts are stated by Al Gore in the documentary
An Inconvenient Truth.…In 39 years, I have never written these words in a movie review, but here they are: You owe it to yourself to see this film. If you do not, and you have grandchildren, you should explain to them why you decided not to.
For more information about the film and to find out what you can do, visit http://www.climatecrisis.net.
One thing that’s painfully clear about that film: we see in a personal way why Gore lost in 2006.
Gore, being raised in patrician surroundings, simply does not have the instinct to enthusiastically engage in the junkyard brawl required for these things, or at least he didn’t then. And I submit that sometimes you need that instinct and you need to follow through on it.
I hope he can do that in 2008; he’d be a very good president, better than the one we have now.
you just went to the movies to get out of the heat. and in doing so contributed to global warming, where do you think all that cool air in the theatre comes from? I’ll tell you …. Shipped in from the artic circle on trucks, yep that is right…. might as well had one of these http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/5234194.stm while you were at it. You make me sick.
P.S. How are you doing, got your letter Jill and I laughed. It was cool (pun intended)
Derek: You should be an “oddball” stories editor for a paper somewhere. You always suss out the craziest stories to pass along. (Although that one is chillingly unfunny.) (No pun intended.)
Mumon: Can you say more about why we need to follow through on the instinct to “enthusiastically engage in the junkyard brawl required for these things”? I’m curious to have you unpack this a bit. I tend to think we don’t, and in a post I’ve been working on for a couple of weeks and hope to post soon, I explain why. In a nutshell, I tend to think that violent speech, like violent action, at best gets us nowhere and at worst aggravates the situation.