LUCIDMEDIA

Planet in Focus: More than Green thinking

Written by Andrew Skinner Monday, 26 October 2009 13:35

Canada’s Planet in Focus International Environmental Film & Video Festival celebrated its 10th anniversary this year honoring visionaries and showing a diverse range of beautifully important films from all over the world. Programmers sought out the best and with hundreds of submissions, they presented over 85 films from 25 different countries; from the opening Canadian film Finding Farley to jaw dropping, highly contrasted films from the hotspots of environmental and human suffering in places like China. Not only can we learn something about the environment to change the world but we can enjoy watching movies about it at the same time.  

There were films about Africa such as Bagyeli Pygmies at the Fringes of the World by Francois-Philippe Gallois and films from Eastern Europe such as Darkness on the Edge of Town by Snjezan Lalovic. There was the Land & Conflict program together with Voices Forward and the International Diaspora Film Festival that looked at problems in countries such as Burma, Israel and Palestine, discussed by various communities that no longer live in their homelands but still care about what happens there. Planet in Focus had something for everyone including workshops for kids and Film Industry Symposiums

Begun ten years ago by Mark Haslam it is largely a selection of films collected and brought to us by Artistic Director Candida Paltiel with co-programmers Tina Hahn and Joel McConvey. Tina Hahn says that when Canadians are asked what the most important issue for them is they often say the environment, so it is hoped that the festival can provide a vision of a better tomorrow. “We don’t want to just tell people we’re showing films for the environment,” says McConvey, “we don’t want people showing up thinking its all dry nature documentaries, didactic conservation stuff; that’s a very important angle for us but we’re looking for good films too. So we want beautiful films that are working to the height of cinematic art, that also deal with environmental themes.”

From what I’ve seen this is a very accurate description. The contrast presented between different peoples’ lived experience and environmental conditions is breathtaking but all shown to us in a way that can help us to understand and feel passionate about these things.

During the Opening Night Gala, Maude Barlow received the International Eco-Hero Award for her clean water activism and work at the UN, and Ian Clifford the CEO of ZENN Motor company received the Canadian Eco Hero Award for his development of electric powered cars. Last, but not least, at the Closing Gala, David Suzuki received the Industry/ Media Eco Hero Award for his CBC show, “The Nature of Things With David Suzuki.” Book ending the galas were the Canadian films Finding Farley and Earth Keepers by Sylvie Van Brabant, both part of the Spotlight Program: “Fast Forward Toward a 2020 Vision” that is a selection of films and panels focusing on real change over the next 10 years.

The Toronto 20/20 evening, hosted by the Toronto Sun’s Rob Granatstein, had a short film of five architects and their views of Toronto’s future with four of them present for a Q&A. The discussion seemed to focus primarily on Toronto’s inner core, the Gardiner Expressway’s future, and the lakeshore, but I would have thought that with Greater Toronto’s population expected to grow by millions that suburban sprawl and public transit would be the real issues. Architect Les Kline as if echoing my thoughts, did say somewhat in defense of downtown Toronto: “If you really want to see crap, go to the suburbs.”

Ian Clifford a pioneer in the electric car business said to me he’s had tremendous support in the market since becoming a public company in 2006, but that “government, from a legislative perspective for low speed vehicles in Canada, has been a huge disappointment. So we went to the U.S. where ironically the car is welcomed. We had tremendous public support [in Canada] but bumped into bureaucracy. That’s a tragedy in a lot of respects…” Once again Canada has lost out in developing its very own innovative car with a pioneering Canadian company and technology. But Clifford is still an eco-hero, focusing now on energy storage power with a Texas based company, EEStor.

That evening’s film Finding Farley was a surprisingly enjoyable odyssey by Leanne Allison, husband Karsten Heuer, and two year old son Zev, to retrace some of Farley Mowat’s book locations from titles such as “Never Cry Wolf,” “Owls in the Family” and “A Whale for the Killing.” Farley was absolutely delighted with the film even though it did not shy away from some of the controversy regarding his suspected embellishment of his stories. He was quick to remind us of his motto “Never let the facts interfere with the truth.” The spry 88-year-old ended the gala opening together with Karsten by howling like wolves.

“We basically wanted to go out there and try and see what inspired him (Farley) and to see, does it still exist, and it does,” said Heuer. I then asked him about the films relation to green ideas. “Both Farley and I are completely cognizant of the fact that the world is in a pretty scary state but what’s going to pull us out of it I think is not becoming incapacitated with overwhelming bad news,” he explained. “People move towards light not darkness. It’s a matter of sort of taking that wall of darkness finding that crack of light and trying to help people to go through there and wedge it apart farther. The purpose of our film was very much to try and help inspire people. A lot of what Farley wrote about 60 years ago still exists and it’s worth keeping.”

The trip seemed to have a remarkably calming effect on his son Zev despite the crazy rivers, black flies, and rolling seas. There were no more tantrums. Almost as if he was happier growing up with the rhythm of nature, just how things were meant to be. They hope that their film inspires people to get out with their families and explore nature.

Particularly of note were eight films from China which have never been seen in Canada. Director Han Wan Feng was present for the film Rural Litigation but the director Huang Jain of Ji Ji Grass was not able to enter Canada because of a visa problem apparently. These two films in particular both deal with land displacement a particularly contentious and hazardous issue in that country now.

Other films such as Living with Shame (Huaqing Jin), a story about the two million people employed in China dismantling waste metals in grim conditions, and Silent Valley (Tian Rong) a film about the masked palm civet cat in China; an animal sometimes blamed for the SARS outbreak in 2003, which resulted in a cull of the animals by the thousands. Ironically, as the film suggests, this may have given the animal a bit of a respite from the dinner tables presenting it as an interesting creature of the wild. Some of these films are more griping than any horror movie could be. The contrast with Finding Farley might suggest the festival be renamed Planets in Focus.