Image Credit: Al Gore This documentary was not what I was expecting at all. I have very limited knowledge of documentaries in the first place, but I have this idea that documentaries are a lot of voice-over and interviews presented in film format to advocate a certain position on an issue. It was interesting that Al Gore decided to film himself giving a powerpoint presentation to an audience for the majority of this film. In comparison to Michael Moore, I felt that Al Gore did little to entertain the viewers of his film. While the graphics and the data he presented were interesting and informative, I think the viewer would need to have a desire to learn and watch this movie to actually become engaged in the film. He made little use of soundtrack and other elements traditionally included in films also. He did make a lot of use of graphs and data charts and illustrations, which is a deviation from traditional film. This did make his argument more persuasive. I guess Gore's film just goes to show that simplicity can be a vehicle for conveying a point.
It was pretty interesting to me that Gore spent so much time laying out the facts of environmental change in the world and the effects it can have, but spent so little time discussing ways that people can try to preserve the earth. I do think it was necessary to spend a lot of time laying out the facts because people are pretty divided on the issue of environmental change and global warming. However, simply flashing the URL of a website to visit for ideas on how to help the earth just before the ending credits begin is not effective. Incorporating ways to help into the ending credits is also not effective. Most people probably do not even leave the movie playing for the tips on how we can help the earth to come on.
While this film was informative, it was not very entertaining and I felt like he did not fully cover the position he was advocating.
After discussing this film with the whole class, I got the sense that Gore's film touched everyone differently. Some people found the powerpoint to be an effective educational tool, while others agreed with me that the powerpoint made for an unentertaining presentation of his argument. Also, some people found the cartoon clip to be offensive, while others thought it was comic relief. Maybe Gore made the choices he did so that he would attract all types of people, not just the educated American who wanted to know more. Maybe he was trying to appeal to people that are less informed and stumble upon the film on a whim.
ReplyDeleteI still feel that to be successful, Gore needed to incorporate the ways that we can change the environmental situation into the body of the film.
I felt that as I watched this film, I was more concerned with how he decided to construct and present the information in the film, rather than the content. I wonder if other viewers also became so caught up in how boring his presentation was and the multitude of graphs that they lost sight of the overarching message.