There’s nothing better to mark this date than watching urgent documentaries and impactful stories that focus on climate change or the fight for sustainability. We’ve chosen 10 movies that you can watch on streaming platforms.
Established in 1996 by the United Nations General Assembly, World Television Day aims to be more than a celebration of the small screen that has become a fundamental part of modern society. This day “marks the recognition of the growing importance that television has in decision-making processes, through the attention it attracts to issues such as conflicts, threats to peace and security”, says a note issued by the European Union. It is thus a way of remembering that it is still “a symbol of communication and globalization in contemporary societies”.
We have selected a number of fiction and documentary films that focus on the issues of sustainability and the climate, either by recalling past struggles or by warning about the future.
The black kite is a well-known species in Portugal. Although they are not endemic to our country, these birds of prey fly here as part of their migratory cycle. They are the protagonists of this multi-award-winning and Oscar-nominated documentary, which follows the efforts of Mohammad Saud and Nadeem Shehzad. Both residents of New Delhi, the capital of India, these two brothers take care of injured black kites — native to the region, but dying in increasing numbers due to pollution — and are a touching example of how humans and animals try to coexist.
Along with primatologist Jane Goodall, David Attenborough must be the world’s best-known figure when it comes to publicizing its natural wonders and attempts to preserve them. The 97-year-old Briton has dedicated most of his life to defending a planet that he now fears is more threatened than ever. This documentary acts as a testimony to the changes he has seen take place and what may follow in the future.
This film is mainly known for two things: it was the one that earned Julia Roberts her first and only Academy award for Best Actress and it was also part of Steven Soderbergh’s double nomination for Best Director – the other film was Traffic. The prestige of the awards has perhaps overshadowed the fact that this work is a dramatization of a very real person. A previously inexperienced legal technician, Erin Brockovich was responsible for filing a lawsuit against the California energy company Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) in 1993 for the contamination of drinking water with chemicals. The movie describes this mission in an entertaining way, without losing the core of its environmental activism.
This is the opposite of Erin Brockovich – less lighthearted, more gloomy and unsettling. A thriller directed by Todd Haynes – one of Hollywood’s most unique filmmakers – it tells the story of Robert Bilott, the environmental lawyer who pursued the chemical company DuPont for the illegal dumping of substances in the state of Ohio. Played here by Mark Ruffalo, Bilott embarked on this 20-year legal odyssey after several people died of contamination.
They are one of nature’s greatest wonders – but also one of the world’s most endangered life forms. The coral reefs that dot our oceans with color are dying at an alarming rate and the team of researchers that this film follows has been documenting their loss. Winner of several awards – including an Emmy – this work warns of the uncertain future for the coral.
In “The Garden of Earthly Delights”, a famous painting by the Dutch master Hieronymus Bosch, we see three representations of the planet – the third, on the right, is hell. It is to this representation that this film, directed by Fisher Stevens and produced by Leonardo DiCaprio – who also takes on the role of the narrator – alludes. This is one of the latest documentaries to detail the risks of climate change and seek to combat climate denialism. In the wake of works such as An Inconvenient Truth, this film travels the globe and points out what could happen with the rise in water levels caused by the melting of the polar ice caps. Its message is that it’s up to us not to end up like the Bosch painting.
Much of the work surrounding climate change focuses on the causes of the problems and their devastating effects. Although it is urgent and necessary to put our finger on the problem, this can also lead people to a form of immobilizing pessimism. That’s why documentaries like this are so important. Narrated by Woody Harrelson, this film focuses on the practices of regenerative agriculture, which are essential to counteract soil depletion and restore soil health. Without soil, there is no food, so the group of scientists, activists and farmers who appear in this film are fighting not only for the environment, but also for our survival.
What Kiss the Ground means for farmers, Ice on Fire does the same for the scientists on the front line in the fight against the harmful effects of global warming. Another documentary produced and narrated by DiCaprio, this time the focus is on the potentially catastrophic risk of methane gas being released in the Arctic due to melting ice caps and the technological advances made to try to reverse this situation by capturing carbon and preventing it from being released into the atmosphere.
Today his name is synonymous with Parasite, the thriller that put him on the world’s lips, but Bong Joon had long been paving his way as a courageous and uniquely talented filmmaker. In this movie, the South Korean has brought to the screen a science fiction story about a huge genetically modified pig and its owner who wants to protect it from the greed of the meat industry. With a luxury cast – Tilda Swinton, Paul Dano and Jake Gyllenhaal feature in this film, among others – this is one of those works of fiction whose story disgusts and outrages without needing to be moralistic.
Directed by one of Hollywood’s most contentious and unloved figures – Paul Schrader, who wrote the screenplays for Martin Scorsese’s Raging Bull and Taxi Driver – this film produced by A24 follows Ernst Toller, a Protestant pastor, played by Ethan Hawke. The central plot of the movie revolves around a couple that Toller wants to help, the man in the relationship being an environmental activist who doesn’t want to have children because he refuses to bring them into a world on the brink of climate catastrophe. Themes like this and how far the legitimacy of activism can go punctuate a work widely celebrated by critics.
On the outskirts of Paris, an elementary school is threatened by the imminent completion of a new educational establishment. The desire to save the school
Nikolaus Geyrhalter’s documentary is a journey through waste and our ability to hide it. In partnership with Zero em Comportamento, we have tickets to give
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