THE 20th PLANET IN FOCUS
Film Festival
BY JORDAN ADLER
At the opening night of last year’s Planet in Focus Environmental Film Festival, the atmosphere was initially fraught, but ultimately hopeful. Katherine Bruce, the festival’s executive director, recalls that there was a sense of urgency at Toronto’s Royal Cinema that evening. In front of a packed house of young adults and outspoken activists, including Commander Chris Hadfield and Dr. David Suzuki, 26-year-old director Slater Jewell-Kemker’s premiered Youth Unstoppable, which chronicles the rise of the global youth climate movement. At one point during the post-film discussion, Suzuki was close to tears as he addressed the filmmaker.
“I was really struck by the anxiety in the room for this generation,” Bruce says. “We were a festival, but it was so much more than showing a film. We brought people together, there was discussion, there was meaningful exchange. It was a place for young people to come to try to find answers and solace and support.”
The growing concern around the climate crisis has spurred the programmers at Canada’s largest environmental film festival to plan a significant 20th anniversary event. This year’s milestone installment will run from October 15 through 20th, the six days preceding the federal election — one where climate change is expected be a critical issue for many voters.
Those dates are not an accident, Bruce says, adding that as environmental consciousness crosses political movements, their festival needs to represent that. “It doesn’t exist in a silo. All of our films, in some way, intersect with [climate change], whether it’s a film about migration, or species habitat loss, or traditional Indigenous communities going against petrochemical companies or mining companies. Climate change infuses almost every topic now.”
An April report from Environment and Climate Change Canada indicated that the country is warming twice as quickly as the rest of the world, with northern sections heating up at an even more accelerated rate. However, the concept for the 20th season is not to numb festivalgoers with despair — an approach that represents Planet in Focus’ original ethos, says founder Mark Haslam.
“I wanted to use film as a catalyst and inspiration for people…to think about creative ways in which they could, in their own lives, do something positive for the environment,” Haslam says, reflecting on the program’s origins.
The festival’s beginnings set a standard. In 2000, its debut year, Haslam had no shortage of film offerings. Forty-six films and videos were screened, hailing from 13 countries. That’s nearly the same number of titles that premiered for Toronto audiences in 2018.
“I did a lot of research on films, filmmakers, and film production companies around the world, and sent out a call for submissions,” Haslam explains of planning that first gala. “Once the films started coming in, [they] were so compelling that I knew that there was no way we could not do this.”
The early festivals relied heavily on grant money; Haslam puts the cost of organizing the 2000 edition at $30,000. Two decades later, the festival remains committed to its non-profit roots and relies on volunteers. But from the start, Haslam also wanted the films to cater to communities rarely represented on screens, believing that environmental film festivals have a responsibility to debunk the perception that environmentalism is a Western concept. “There was this perception that environmentalists were ‘white guys in boats,’” he says, describing organizations such as Greenpeace. “For me, every culture around the world has teachings and ways of relating to land, animals, and the environment that we can all learn from.”
Haslam says he takes pride that Planet in Focus has always prioritized the voices of local Indigenous populations and other minority groups that had not seen their stories on the film festival circuit. After Haslam left the organization in 2005, a special award was created in his name and is given to a film that is made by a member of an under-represented community. Zhao Liang’s Behemoth, which explores the environmental, sociological, and public health effects of coal-mining in China and Inner Mongolia, won in 2016. The film was banned in China.
Among the premieres at recent galas were films directed by Canadian elementary school students. The Toronto Eco-Film Lab workshops, run by Planet in Focus, train teachers to use tablets and computer-based filmmaking software that they can later share with students. Bruce estimates that around 30 schools currently participate in these workshops. With those tools at hand, students have the chance to shoot and edit short films on themes connected to the environment. A few of these amateur efforts end up getting a spotlight at the October festival. The 2018 event featured three works made by students at the Kahnawake Survival School in Quebec.
The enthusiasm from students around these projects is palpable, as younger generations are especially concerned about the potential consequences of failing to act on this urgent issue. “Every year, it’s skewing younger and younger,” Bruce says of the festival’s audience. “We are seeing the effects of the intensity and scrutiny…the effect of young leaders like [Swedish climate activist] Greta Thunberg coming to the fore.”
In 2017, the festival introduced the Rob Stewart Youth Eco-Hero Award, in honour of the late activist. This year’s prize will go to Autumn Peltier, a member of the Wikwemikong First Nation, in recognition of her advocacy work for clean water for Indigenous communities. Last year, at the age of 13, Autumn addressed world leaders at the UN General Assembly on the issue of water protection.
Planet in Focus also annually honours two “Eco-Heroes” — one Canadian, one international — whose body of creative work helps to raise awareness about environmental issues. This year, Louie Psihoyos, the filmmaker behind the endangered species doc Racing Extinction and an Oscar-winner for 2009’s The Cove, will be awarded with the International Eco-Hero on closing night. The Canadian Eco-Hero is Northern Alberta’s Melina Laboucan-Massimo for her work on social, environmental and climate justice issues.
Though the full line up for this year’s festival was not available at the time of writing, a few program highlights include: Dark Eden, which documents Fort McMurray, home of the third largest oil reserve on the planet, as the filmmakers search for an answer to the question: “How high is the price for a better life?”; The Last Male on Earth, about the last male northern white rhino, Sudan, who passed away in March 2018; and Los Reyes, which takes the audience inside the oldest skatepark in Santiago, Chile, where two stray dogs have made their home in this open space full of hurtling skateboards and rowdy teenagers. As always, audiences are encouraged to stick around after the films have ended. The importance of having a dialogue between filmmakers, activists, and audiences is key to making the festival work as a space for sharing ideas.
Despite the ecological challenges showcased onscreen, and the fiercely political bent of several of the films, the environmental film festival thrives on pushing messages of hope. “You have to show the path forward,” Bruce explains, echoing Haslam’s original philosophy. “I think change does happen from a place of inspiration, rather than despair. I really believe that film has that ability to move you and to inspire you.”
For more information on the 20th annual
Planet in Focus Film Festival, visit planetinfocus.org.
