Before the Flood (2016)This must surely be the follow-up to Al Gore's 2006 'The Inconvenient Truth'. It is an indirect manner of telling that nothing much has changed in the past ten years except that what was known as global warming is now referred to as climate change. The latter seems to be a more appropriate term as the weather change caused by the excessive emission of greenhouse gases also give rise to colder winters as well.
Before the Industrial Revolution, the world used to be in a steady state. Greenhouse gases (water vapour, carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, fluorinated carbons and ozone) from the perspiration of plants and animals helped to maintain the temperature of Earth which would otherwise be too cold (-18 degree C) for human inhabitance. The corals in the sea and lush green forest act as a reservoir to absorb the extra greenhouse gases primarily carbon dioxide, CO2.
Man's insatiable desire to assault of Nature with their economic activities, like burning forests, cutting trees, over-dependence on fossil fuel and even the overproduction of methane by the cattle industry just tipped the balance. Scientists say that a rise in the world temperature of 2-degrees above the pre-industrial era could be disastrous and irreversible.
Leonardo DiCaprio produced and hosted this National Geographic sponsored documentary on this issue. He flies around the globe to investigate the extent of this problem and see for himself what various countries are doing to curtail this potentially devastating problem.
During the shooting of his last film, The Revenant, in Canada, his director had a Herculean time trying to find a snowy mountainous forest for his set. All the snow had melted due to climate change. The Boreal forests had all disappeared.
The biggest polluter in the production of greenhouse gases is China. They, according to the documentary, are taking a concerted effort to offset their bad record. So does India, the third biggest polluter. Many countries are exploiting green energies like wind and solar energies to its full potential. Unfortunately, the second largest culprit, the USA is still in denial mode. Many big companies think that climate change is just a hoax. The real reason for their refusal is their business interests in fossil fuel. Many American companies, including Koch Industries and many lobbyists for the US Government, are climate change deniers.
Many of Man's activity cause irreparable damage to the environment. Fracking for oil and gas leave a denuded piece of wasteland. Deforestation for palm oil cultivation and open burning in Sumatra release too much carbon dioxide into our air. The beef industry is notorious for emitting way too much of greenhouse gases in the form of methane. Compared to other types of food production, including rice cultivation and husbandry, cattle leave way too much carbon footprint.
History shows that weather change had been a cause for change of government and a reason for a revolution. Hence, the documentary tries to empower people to choose leaders who would listen to them other than the other way around.
Change is on its way. Many European countries are tapping into solar and wind energies. Sweden has become the first fossil fuel free nation. President Barack Obama has endorsed the Paris Accord on climate change. Many countries have imposed a carbon tax to syphon the revenue to develop other energy sources. The producer of the film too claimed to have voluntarily paid his dues in carbon tax for their long distance flying during the making of the documentary.
The film ends with Dicaprio giving an address to United Nations General Assembly in his capacity as a special envoy for climate change.
The scriptures in its various forms have all told us in so many ways of the dark look of the future. Many Eastern philosophies and even monolithic religions have advised us to be respectable of the environment. The picture below appeared quite frequently in the documentary. It is a 15th-century triptych by Hieronymus Bosch called The Garden of Earthly Delights. It probably shows the beginning of our world, followed by our present time and the gloomy future of darkness on the third panel. The trouble with us is that we cherry-pick what we want and use it for own self-interest and self-indulgence.
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