This is a thorough and damning account of the so-called “Tobacco Strategy” and the “improvements” upon it, in which larger corporations fund think tanks and pay real scientists to discredit the work of other scientists which threatens their products.
Tag: Environmentalism
Taming the Garden (2021, Salomé Jashi)
You know that scene in Fitzcarraldo when Herzog drags a boat over a mountain the rainforest to show the hubris and folly of man? Well, combine that theme with Mega Movers and a really great eye and you have some idea of this amazing documentary about a man buying up the great trees of Georgia …
The New Corporation: The Unfortunately Necessary Sequel (2020, Jennifer Abbott, Joel Bakan)
I saw the original Corporation sometime back in the aughts. I have no idea whether or not I would like it now. This film is infuriating, both because of the problems in the world it reminds us of, and because of how unfocused it is. In many ways, it feels like two movies, the sequel …
The Bet: Paul Ehrlich, Julian Simon, and Our Gamble over Earth’s Future (2013) by Paul Sabin
This is an interesting book ostensibly about a bet between a biologist and an economist over the earth’s future, but really about the problems of extremism and the folly of prediction.
Cool It (2010, Ondi Timoner)
Weirdly, this film was recommended to me by a climate change denier. I assume he is now a former climate change denier. I wonder why this film, of all films, convinced him, or whether it’s just been the weather, if you’ll excuse my saying so.
The Island President (2011, Jon Shenk)
This is an affecting movie about the potential crisis we as a world – and specifically, anyone living close to the ocean without a hill in the way – are likely facing in the next few decades. The filmmakers have found a very charismatic man to follow around and it makes the whole thing a …