It has been a decade since the Oscar-winning An Inconvenient Truth brought climate change to light and championed it as a global concern. Ten years later, Al Gore presents new research demonstrating that 14 of Earth’s 15 hottest years in recorded history have been since 2001. In light of America’s recent withdrawal from the 2016 Paris Agreements, An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power is urgent and essential viewing.
Bonni Cohen and Jon Shenk take the directorial reigns to recap the successes and setbacks since the first film. At the centre of it all is the slightly grayer, mellower, but no less impassioned, Al Gore. He continues touring his PowerPoint lectures, updated with not only new grim facts, but also encouraging examples of successful green energy projects. He trains the next generation of eco-leaders with his Climate Leadership initiatives and uses his considerable connections to negotiate deals with the world’s leaders. However, the most powerful sections are the visually startling check-ins he does with scientific researchers regarding our planet’s health. While many naysayers mocked his 2006 scientific, animated projections of rising waters flooding the World Trade Center area in Manhattan, no one was laughing when 2012’s Hurricane Sandy did just that.
The former Vice President is a modern-day superhero decked out in his button-up shirts and cowboy boots. It is surprising and fascinating how lonely the fight has been, and the fact that he has been doing it now for nearly a quarter century with no signs of slowing down is admirable. With the health and future of the planet at stake, Gore and those training with him are certainly the heroes we need.
“An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power is an important and relevant worldwide look at the environmental crisis.” (Jordan Ruimy, We Got This Covered)
“It’s less an attack on big business (though such sentiments are certainly present) than a call for a rational assessment of proven facts. If it does occasionally dabble in hero worship of its subject, it also makes the effective case that somebody has to keep showing up when nobody else can be bothered.” (Dominick Suzanne-Mayer, Consequence of Sound)