150m of glacier is gone
in less than a century. Massacre happened at a little village of Odiyama. Oil
companies correct the government report on environmental issues. They do seem disparate, don’t they? But they
are not. Filmed by Franny Armstrong, and starring Peter
Postlethwaite, The age of stupid(2009)
portrays the striking facts, and stories. And the powerful theme, contradiction
courses through the whole film.
The man went through a terrible hurricane, Katrina, and
lost everything including his house, truck and computer. He doesn’t regret
working at the oil industry, SHELL for 30years and he returns to his work to find more
oil. People are cognizant of the danger of hurricane, but they are just aware
of it. They neither act nor look back at their life.
Then, the video goes to
Nigeria. Despite Nigeria’s possessing abundant amount of oil, Layefa, 22 year
old woman says that she is getting poorer and poorer. She is suffering the
Resource Curse by Shell. After all these, Layefa says ‘If we live that
(American) kind of life, we’ll just want to live in the Earth forever.’ She is
suffering, but still wants to live like them, wasting things. And one more
thing, the Earth doesn’t want you to live forever
if you live like them.
Lastly, there are UK
people who recognize the importance of wind energy. Piers, joining the
environmental movement, persuades them, but they reject the wind farm plan at
last. They say it spoils your enjoyment, or your view. They silently shout out
Not In My Backyard(NIMBY).
As we can see, these are
the contradiction in the movie. In other words, these are the obstacles
blocking the protection of environment. Especially, NIMBY is one of the main
reasons why renewable energy plan fails. In the U.K., which aims to generate
about one-third of its electricity from renewable sources by 2020, local
opposition is holding up proposed wind projects. (forbes) Moreover, according to a March report from
the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, 45% of clean energy projects proposed in recent
years have been delayed or abandoned due to local opposition..
In the movie, some
British people don’t want wind farm though they know its benefit. They don’t
want their views to be spoiled, nor to be sacrificed just for some renewable
energy whose efficiency is not even proved. However, they should know the
fossil fuel energy wasn’t also efficient from the first. Renewable energy is at
the very start of their development. If NIMBY drives out the renewable energy,
then I doubt if they would have a proper chance to improve themselves.
Basically, [The World is
Flat] advocates globalization, multinational corporation and outsourcing.
Friedman agrees that there are some problems of them, but he tries to emphasize
on the bright side; as a developing country, they can make an economic basis to
build their own industry. As a multinational corporation of developed country,
they can make even better quality products with same cost.
However, this film goes
against it. SHELL, representing the multinational corporation, is shown to be
irresponsible, immoral company. In the case of Layefa, she suffers a resource
curse from SHELL. because the government and Shell
built an unsound relationship. Also, Pareau criticize transporting potato from
France to Italy, and then bringing them back as a mash. He says the same thing
happens to the milk, and calls it meaningless trip. Ever since the tunnel
emerged in Mont Blanc, they are generating carbon. And this question popped in
the mind. ‘Should economical and environmental concern always be contradictory?’
I couldn’t find an answer to it. But, I think this is an ultimate question that
we should solve. Since this is a contradiction between industry and environment
that we should solve.
The age of stupid is a nice piece of documentary film. It provided us a new aspect towards the environment, and a chance to think of it. Finishing this review, I’d like to make a quote from the film. ‘They are fixated on the sand of small area under their feet, as a tsunami races toward the shore.’ Now I will ask one more question. Aren’t you being like those people in the picture?
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