'Earth Days' - A Film by Robert Stone
I was born in 1969, so the environmental movement has always been a part of my life. Over the years I've absorbed bits and pieces of the way it started: that "Silent Spring" by Rachel Carson inspired a generation of activists; that the first Earth Day was organized as a teach-in by U.S. Senator Gaylord Nelson of Wisconsin, on April 22, 1970, and that 20 million people participated in it.
But in general, my attention, along with most of the world, has been trained on the future of the movement, not the past.
Award-winning documentary film maker Robert Stone believes that it's also important for us to understand the history of the environmental movement. In his new film, "Earth Days", he combines archival footage and present-day interviews with nine eco-pioneers, to construct the first Genesis tale for the green movement.
The "Earth Days" narrators are:
- Former Secretary of the Interior Stewart Udall
- Biologist/"Population Bomb" author Paul Ehrlich
- Whole Earth Catalog founder Stewart Brand
- Apollo Nine astronaut Rusty Schweickart
- Renewable energy activist Hunter Lovins
- Earth Day organizer Denis Hayes
- Republican-turned-Democrat Congressman Pete McCloskey
- Growth expert/"Limits to Growth" author Dennis Meadows
- Radical population-control activist Stefanie Mills
Some of the archival footage is jaw-dropping. From the 50s, you see clouds of DDT being sprayed on cheerful picnickers, nine-foot wide refrigerators filled with processed food, and cars that are so big. And then there is the footage from the 70s of devastating pollution. Crushed cars piled-up alongside rivers, skies filled with smog, and the famous "Keep America Beautiful" anti-littering/pollution ad with the crying Native American.
It's especially effective when Stone has his narrators talk about their activities in the 70s while showing clips from the era, turning his film into a personal testimony of their participation in this chapter of cultural history.
"Earth Days", which was chosen as the closing night film at Sundance Film Festival, ends on a cautionary yet optimistic note. It shows that we've been able to address big problems before -- air pollution was so bad that some predicted we'd need to abandon U.S. cities by the 1980s! -- but it also warns us that time is running out for the serious changes required to save the environment.
Earth Day 2010 (April 22nd) will be the 40th anniversary of this amazing grassroots demonstration. Plans are already in the works to make the celebration/demonstration have an even bigger impact than the first one. See the film "Earth Days" and you will understand what that means -- and be inspired to take part!
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