I Am Greta (12A.)
Directed by Nathan Grossman
Featuring Greta Thunberg, Svante Thunberg. 97 mins.
If I were a youngster worried about the climate crisis I think I'd feel inclined to, very reluctantly and with a heavy heart, bundle Greta Thunberg into a sack and chuck her in a river like an unwanted Christmas pup. Callous and unforgivable I know, but this is a battle for your survival and the oldies – the-best-of-everything-is-good-enough-for-them generation - are desperate for any excuse to do nothing. The joyless puritanism of Greta's new model army might be reason enough to conclude that humanity's future was not up to much anyway and can be written off as a bad lot.
(On a similar note, I'd recommend an Extinction Rebellion rebranding. ER assume that a big scary word like extinction will shock people into realising the urgency of the situation; in fact, it's much more likely to get them running the numbers on the likelihood of their pension provision stretching to the end of civilisation. The sooner the rainy day, the less you need to put aside.)
I doubt this documentary portrait will change perceptions much but, apart from when she is moaning about meat and dairy being served at a UN climate conference, she is very endearing. You treasure the few moments when a smile replaces the Stephen-Merchant-frown on her face. Director/ cameraman/ sound recordist/ one-man-band Grossman was there from the very beginning, filming her sitting alone outside the Swedish Parliament on her first school strike. How very convenient, but it seems like he was just the beneficiary of an outrageous piece of good fortune and that the Stockholm artistic circle is small enough that a documentary filmmaker would hear about the activities of the daughter of a former opera singer and actor. From there he has the inside track on this lonely little girl, ostracised because of her Asperger's, becoming a global superstar in a few months, concluding with her sailing across the Atlantic.
Greta's recurring question is how people can consistently avoid addressing such an important topic. Inadvertently, the film demonstrates very clearly the answer. Its focus is entirely on the personality, on the story; issues are completely avoided. Early on Greta expresses amazement that there are "politicians who don't even know what the Albedo Effect or the Keeling Curve are," but the film doesn't tell us what they are. Instead, we get to see her and her father travelling by train and electric car to meet and be patronised by various Windbags of High Office. You don't have to be Brexiteer to treasure the moment she makes clear what a total tosser pisshead European Commission president Jean-Claude Junker is.
Directed by Nathan Grossman
Featuring Greta Thunberg, Svante Thunberg. 97 mins.
If I were a youngster worried about the climate crisis I think I'd feel inclined to, very reluctantly and with a heavy heart, bundle Greta Thunberg into a sack and chuck her in a river like an unwanted Christmas pup. Callous and unforgivable I know, but this is a battle for your survival and the oldies – the-best-of-everything-is-good-enough-for-them generation - are desperate for any excuse to do nothing. The joyless puritanism of Greta's new model army might be reason enough to conclude that humanity's future was not up to much anyway and can be written off as a bad lot.
(On a similar note, I'd recommend an Extinction Rebellion rebranding. ER assume that a big scary word like extinction will shock people into realising the urgency of the situation; in fact, it's much more likely to get them running the numbers on the likelihood of their pension provision stretching to the end of civilisation. The sooner the rainy day, the less you need to put aside.)
I doubt this documentary portrait will change perceptions much but, apart from when she is moaning about meat and dairy being served at a UN climate conference, she is very endearing. You treasure the few moments when a smile replaces the Stephen-Merchant-frown on her face. Director/ cameraman/ sound recordist/ one-man-band Grossman was there from the very beginning, filming her sitting alone outside the Swedish Parliament on her first school strike. How very convenient, but it seems like he was just the beneficiary of an outrageous piece of good fortune and that the Stockholm artistic circle is small enough that a documentary filmmaker would hear about the activities of the daughter of a former opera singer and actor. From there he has the inside track on this lonely little girl, ostracised because of her Asperger's, becoming a global superstar in a few months, concluding with her sailing across the Atlantic.
Greta's recurring question is how people can consistently avoid addressing such an important topic. Inadvertently, the film demonstrates very clearly the answer. Its focus is entirely on the personality, on the story; issues are completely avoided. Early on Greta expresses amazement that there are "politicians who don't even know what the Albedo Effect or the Keeling Curve are," but the film doesn't tell us what they are. Instead, we get to see her and her father travelling by train and electric car to meet and be patronised by various Windbags of High Office. You don't have to be Brexiteer to treasure the moment she makes clear what a total tosser pisshead European Commission president Jean-Claude Junker is.
