A "thumbs up" from Roger Ebert for "An Inconvenient Truth" - and
four stars. He calls Al Gore's movie "fascinating" and "relentless."
Ebert's a good writer - and you can feel his sense of the film's importance, and his determination to get people to see it. "In 39 years, I have never written these words in a movie review, but here they are: You owe it to yourself to see this film.
"If you do not, and you have grandchildren, you should explain to them why you decided not to."
Knowing people only read the first few paragraphs, Ebert opens with a pointedly concise executive summary.
"I am a liberal, but I do not intend this as a review reflecting any kind of politics. It reflects the truth as I understand it, and it represents, I believe, agreement among the world's experts.Global warming is real.
It is caused by human activity.
Mankind and its governments must begin immediate action to halt and reverse it.
If we do nothing, in about 10 years the planet may reach a "tipping point" and begin a slide toward destruction of our civilization and most of the other species on this planet.
After that point is reached, it would be too late for any action.
I've always loved Ebert's reviews, and he returns to his laid-back, conversational style - while still making crucial points. I remember Ebert getting sharing a personal story when
reviewing "The Insider," the 1999 movie about a tobacco-industry whistleblower. He wrote:
Watergate didn't kill my parents. Cigarettes did.
When reviewing "An Inconvenient Truth," he gets just as personal.
Gore says that although there is "100 percent agreement" among scientists, a database search of newspaper and magazine articles shows that 57 percent question the fact of global warming, while 43 percent support it. These figures are the result, he says, of a disinformation campaign started in the 1990s by the energy industries to "reposition global warming as a debate." It is the same strategy used for years by the defenders of tobacco. My father was a Luckys smoker who died of lung cancer in 1960, and 20 years later it was still "debatable" that there was a link between smoking and lung cancer. Now we are talking about the death of the future, starting in the lives of those now living."
Ebert also interviewed Al Gore at the Cannes Film Festival, and got him a chance to ask Gore the one question not addressed in the movie. Because the film was intended to be non-political, Gore made a point of not mentioning the current administration. But Ebert wouldn't let it go. What about Bush?
Gore shrugged. "There was a big new official study last month that said global warming is real and human activity is largely responsible. The White House, quote, 'accepted the study without endorsing its conclusions.'"
And Ebert ever-so-gently hints at the political connection between our current environmental problems and the current administration.
This interview was last Sunday.
On Monday, an Associated Press story began:
Is President Bush likely to see Al Gore's documentary about global warming?
"Doubt it," Bush said coolly.
Maybe the future rests on the acts of individuals. Ebert hints at this in the last line of his review.
I did a funny thing when I came home after seeing "An Inconvenient Truth." I
went around the house turning off the lights.