National Geographic: Human Footprint (2008)

In a National Geographic special event, The Human Footprint reveals the extraordinary impact that each of our lives has on the world around us. In a playful, surprising and thought-provoking portrait of our time on earth, National Geographic demonstrates, in a series of remarkable visuals, what makes up an average human life today and how everything we do has impact on the world around us. In this unique journey through life, it shows all the people you will ever know, how much waste you will produce, the amount of fuel youll consume and how much youve got to pack in during your 2,475,526,000 seconds on Earth.

Sadly upbeat, but flawed.

The documentary was sadly upbeat for the subject matter. The host was constantly smiling and explaining all of the resources which go into any given thing and how many of that particular item the average American uses throughout his/her life. As if its a good thing to say that we use so-many thousand of disposable toothbrushes in our lifetimes.

Also, there are parts of the documentary that that disgust me. In order to show you the number of eggs the average American eats, they dump them all from a bulldozer. This, of course, destroys the usefulness of the eggs...and for an animal rights activist its like watching abortions.

Continuing, I have to say that the number for how many chickens, pigs and cows each American eats in their lifetime has got to be low. I am currently a 22 year old vegetarian, and I used to eat chicken wings a lot - there's no way I only ate 17 chickens worth of wings, let alone everything else.

Now, on to the good stuff. I certainly like how this documentary shows us the consumption - it lays items out that either are that item or represent that item. By the end of the film there are diapers, cans, bread, buns, toothbrushes, hair and skin care products and many more things simply laid out in a fairly open area to show us the massive consumption. If it were not for this visual, I don't think I would have the respect for this documentary that I do.

Because the negative moments are fleeting, and the positive moments continue throughout, this documentary was certainly worth purchasing. October 12, 2008

First Fascinating...Then Boring....Then Irritating

This film tracks the life of a boy and girl from childhood through old age.

At various stages of life their consumption of various resources is examined in great detail.

The early displays of actual counts of what they use are at first fascinating and impressive. Gee...I thought... someone went to lot of effort to assemble and set up over 43,000 soft drink cans.

Then as the statistical bombardment continues, one begins to wonder are these numbers really correct. Each stat is accompanied with yet another visual display of what the number means. OK...I get it...I don't need to see the actual number of toothbrushes I will use in a lifetime.

Finally, the whole experience becomes irritating, if there is a point here the film is not making it clear (at least for me). Even small uses become large values over the 77 years of the average lifespan.

Are we supposed to apologize for being alive? That was the way I felt a few times. Apparently you are really not a good person if you eat cheeseburgers.

I would certainly agree that there are waste and excesses that need to be curbed especially here in America, but the film seems to imply that consumers are to blame for all of it.

There is nothing in the film about the endless marketing and advertising that drive all of us to over-buy and over-use. Consumption and more consumption is just what corporations want and their role in driving that to excess is never explored.

The planned and engineered obsolescence of many products that requires us to re-buy the same items that fill up the landfills is also never considered.

As an hypothetical example, the "Acme Widget Company" wants you to buy as many "widgets" as possible in your lifetime, building them to last is the very last thing they want to do. Meanwhile landfills are accumulating thousands of broken and worn out "widgets".

There is also nothing about the real source of the human footprint impact and that is over-population. Even consumption in moderate amounts really starts to add up with 6+ billion of us out there.

Finally, it seems the film misses a golden opportunity to discuss the positive benefits of recycling. If it was discussed at all I missed it.

Human Footprint is certainly worth a look, but the steady stream of "average" statistics may not be entertaining for some. For me, I felt a sense of relief when the film was over.



July 19, 2008

Amazing Video

The "Human Footprint" was first aired on the National Geographic Channel earlier this year. It is a graphic portrayal of the quantities of stuff that an average American consumes over the course of a lifetime.

The criticism of our lifestyle is implicit. No one says what all this is doing to the planet, but it quickly becomes obvious that enormous quantities of stuff must be manufactured, consumed, and discarded in order to support the high standard of living that we enjoy. You only have to look at the herd of pigs, tons of potatoes, or football field expanse of bread to be amazed at what we consume.

The story is told with a sense of humor. The kitchen filling with fruit is funny. However, the question that comes to mind is whether we will always have the resources to keep this up. The inventory shown by National Geographic is food for thought.

Another interesting video on the subject of the consumer economy is the 20-minute "The Story of Stuff." It does not seem to be available on Amazon, but can be found for viewing on the web. "Stuff" is more direct in its point of view.
May 15, 2008

visually impressive, lacking in substantial content

I teach high school science and 100 level science classes at the local university. I showed the dvd for both groups with a worksheet I made up for them (anyone in education knows that you must give the students something to work on relating to the movie they're watching, or else they won't pay attention). It was visually impressive to see the amounts of "stuff" we go through in a lifetime, and it's a good movie because students have no idea what these amounts really are; they cannot fathom how immense 43,000 soda cans is. However that's really all there was to this dvd-they show a product (or activity), explain (briefly)how it is constructed, or shipped, and then they actually display the amount with the number (literaly they laid out 43,000+ soda cans in a parking lot). There was no explanation of the impact or problems associated with the levels of consumption or waste. And after 30-40 minutes (the dvd is 1.5hrs) it gets well, kind of boring. So good for providing the visual concept, poor in terms exploring the underlying cause and consequences. May 14, 2008

OUTSTANDING!!!

My entire loved this documentary! It even held my 5 yr olds full attention. We loved the creative ways that the information was put across, and it really opened our eyes as to exactly how much we as individuals affect the earth. We learned a lot and we plan on changing a lot of things as well! April 21, 2008

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