Last night I went to a convivial private screening of An Inconvenient Truth, sponsored by our solar contractor, Independent Energy Systems.
Yes, you read that right— we're getting solar panels installed on our roof next week, and I look forward to running wild with sun power while I sneer at PG&E. Fetch me my bikini and plug-in vibrator!
The state of California is currently offering substantial rebates for solar installation, and with energy prices resembling diamond offerings, our family figured it was time to do something before we're out on the streets in rags begging for a crumb of coal.
And yes, to top it all off, I am an ecology nut, a tree-hugger... I'm perversely drawn to bumper stickers that say things like "May We Live Long and Die Out." I think the Humboldt County All-Species Parade is more fun than a tin-roof sundae.
I provide this background, so you can understand my surprised reaction to "Al Gore's movie." I had no idea that it was a presidential campaign advertisement.
It's not selling Global Warming or ecological diligence— it's selling the next president of the United States.
Mainstream movie reviewers are acting as if this is a fine ecology film from the Audubon Society that just happens to feature an intelligent thoughtful performance by Citizen Gore. But that is disingenuous!
While other politicos are barely web-savvy, Gore has changed the rules of the game— he's made a whole friggin' movie that's supposedly about an "issue," but is really a 90 minute seance with the undeclared candidate.
Where's Hillary's movie? The Devil Wears Land's End?
I'm not an environmental smarty-pants. I was eager to deepen my own understanding and analysis of global warming. I get more scared watching giant pieces of the Antarctic ice shelf break up than I would watching The Omen. I was hoping for an ecology version of The Corporation.
Inconvenient Truth is not like that. It's a puff piece, a beauty pageant, something that makes you go, "Oh my, he really is wonderful, darling, let's send money!"
And its eco-education value...? It's nothing you couldn't have heard on Earth Day, 1970.
If you don't know that the polar ice caps are melting, that species are disappearing left and right, and that the earth's temperature is boiling like hard candy, then yes, by all means, go see this movie and wake the fuck up.
If you don't know that our government is a noxious backwater of inaction and pollution fascism, then, my dear old thing, you must take in a viewing.
But.... excuse me! I am already on board with Toxic Meltdown 101!
After the first hour, I thought, "Well, I'm still interested in what Gore's strategies are for forestalling the inevitable"— is that awful to say? He's so sunny about how we can save the earth at the last moment. I am decidedly more grim, but I'm devoted to creative activism, and if he's got something up his sleeve, I'm all ears.
But Gore's suggestions teed me off.
He suggests prayer. Oh, for Christsakes. Yeah, I'll get the Flying Spaghetti Monster on the phone right now.
He suggests bicycling to work. Isn't that nice?
If you're the average American, your town and your commute lacks— or hinders— any kind of safe bike trail or public transit system that could be put into use by the majority of the population. It's a total joke.
All that individualistic crap about thrift and personal ecology chaps my hide! My very "liberal" town doesn't even provide compost garbage bins. The most heavily trafficked boulevard in our county is a death hazard for bicyclists. Our bus system is used by the very poor and the very young— and you could spend all day just trying to get out of Dodge to the nearest big city.
How about this: Stop asking people to be "plucky," and put some national teeth into an environmentally sound infrastructure!
The other cute suggestion from Inconvenient Truth was to vote for environmentally savvy candidates, or "run for congress" yourself. Everyone in my audience giggled.
I am sorry to sound like such a grump. I do my bit of personal conservation, and I'm thrilled if others are getting the recycling bug— but I expected SO MUCH MORE.
The "more" part was Gore as presidential primetime. He was shown large, beautiful, and manly. There was no girly stuff in this movie. He tells you about shooting on his father's property as a kid in Tennessee. We see a tender part where he talks about his young son's close call with death, and how it made him treasure life even more keenly.
Now, OF COURSE, such a life event must have been awful, but the way they portrayed it was like a Lifetime Movie! I felt manipulated to "fall in love" with Al at every turn, and it just didn't wash.
He can't win with "extremists" like myself, of course. The whole Pray With Me and My Little Gun shit nauseates me. I'm outraged if he thinks his Democratic Party has done anything near enough to fight pollution, or that the only reason everything is so TEWWIBLE is because of that nogoodnik George Bush. Both parties have stalled, denied, and dealt wretched compromises that dug our grave that much faster.
If Gore defied his party and spoke truth to power at great personal cost every step of the way, THEN I'd be ready to see a saintly biopic. We need a little MORE setting yourself on fire, Al, and a little less glossy gel and Sierra Club calendar mottoes!
So there you go. If I was reading a bitter, Ann Coulter-type review about Inconvenient Truth, of course I'd defend it. Al's right that saving the planet is a helluva better political platform than "fighting terrorism." But because of his campaign ambitions, I'm more pessimistic about American leadership in this crisis since I saw the movie than before I walked in the screening room!
Am I nuts? Does every other tree-hugger just love this movie and I'm an old Scrooge? Your thoughts, please...
Solar Sue
