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An Inconvenient Truth By Alex Conde Rating: 4.5 out of 5 Stars Despite only a limited theatrical release, An Inconvenient Truth is showing endurance in the box office that can easily tell you how good this movie is.
Directed by David Guggenheim and staring none other than former Vice-President of the United States Al Gore, An Inconvenient Truth is another installment in the trend of high caliber documentaries that have been making their way to the theatres in the last few years. Al Gore uses his charisma and ability to connect with the audience to turn the film from a potential “gloom and doom” production into an informative and empowering piece. For those of you who last saw Al Gore during the presidential campaign he “lost”, you won’t even recognize this man any longer. He’s older, but he also seems more honest. Through the movie, we learn about his connection with climate change and how he’s been campaigning for improved environmental standards since his early days of politics. We also learn that Al Gore has been spending much of his time since that fateful election traveling the world and giving presentations on climate change, and quite honestly, the practice he’s had definitely shows. An Inconvenient Truth mainly consists of portions of those presentations interwoven with information about Al Gore’s life. At points, the story of Al Gore can distract from the movie itself, and many have commented that a movie like this could very well be a stepping point for another presidential campaign. The movie also reaches into pop-culture, bringing in clips from the episode of the cartoon show “Futurama” to demonstrate a more comedic and ignorant view of global warming and potential solutions to the problem. Bringing in footage from Gore’s past and interweaving it with interview clips, Guggenheim puts together the framework of a strong story on which to hang the information about climate change that the movie conveys. If you go see this movie simply out of hatred for George Bush, you will likely be disappointed. While the issues of politics and that particular presidential race are touched upon, the movie doesn’t go into much depth. It’s as if the director recognized that Al Gore can’t appear without mentioning losing the presidential race, so they try to do so in a way that’s mildly humorous rather than bitter. All criticisms aside, the movie is still quite worth seeing. It informs and educates while at the same time avoiding much of the much of the moral drama that infects educational documentaries that focus on a particular issue. I walked out feeling educated, but not feeling like the makers of the movie thought I was a horrible person for leading the life I led. Whatever you think of the topic material, the movie will make you think about the topic itself, which is an important step to raising aw |
