As you know from previous posts, the social cause that I am spending time on these days is Climate Change (see the Critter Crisis post for why and what i'm doing about it).
I recently saw the screening of 11th Hour which is a new documentary from Leo DiCaprio and Directors Leila Conners Peterson and Nadia Conners. I highly recommend the movie to those that are skeptical or simply interested in the issues facing our planet Earth. Inconvenient Truth does a great job using the star power of Al Gore to lay out a compelling case for Climate Change. 11th Hour is different in two ways. First, it provides the audience an overview of the many problems facing Earth - not just climate change (e.g. overpopulation, overuse of land, deforestation, etc) - the meta theme is overuse of our resources. The second difference is that almost half the film is dedicated to the solutions that are being worked on to address these issues - the audience leaves the theater with a sense of hope and motivation vs fear and helplessness.
The downside of the film is that it is done in a documentary style that is very informative for the "intellectuals" of our world but is missing the story arc and characters resulting that's the hallmark of cinema to make it a mass market success. That said, this is a good start in bringing it all together and perhaps will inspire more film makers to blend characters/storytelling to get the message to a wider audience.
I'll leave you with a great concept from the film - we are wrong to say our planet is in crisis when its the human race which is at risk - the earth will do just fine in the long run without us....
