“The Age of Stupid” is an idiotic name for a film that everyone should see. In its examination of cultural choices that ignore the impending effects of global warming, the film provokes a sense of urgency, disgust with consumerism, and a desire for change.
Actor Pete Postlethwaite poses as an archivist in the year 2055 after the major repercussions of global warming have reshaped the earth in dynamic ways.
He lives in a fortified structure in the Arctic Ocean north of Norway. Once inside, the camera zooms through the various levels of the base.
It contains collections from all national galleries and museums, preserved specimens of most species lined two by two, and a significant computer database.
The camera then takes the perspective of a computer screen as the archivist creates a video log. The first words out of his mouth are, “We could have saved ourselves.”
As he speaks, he fiddles with the screen and pulls up documentary footage of the present, filmed by director Franny Armstrong, to illustrate the consumer culture that led to the world’s destruction.
His archive follows seven stories: an Indian business tycoon opening up a low cost airline, a hurricane Katrina survivor who worked for Shell Oil, the oldest French tour guide of Mont Blanc, two children in Iraq, a woman in Nigeria and a British environmentalist who specializes in wind power.
Documentary footage framed in a fictitious future setting gives immediacy to a tragic future that may not be so far away. Opening images of 2055 are based on mainstream scientific projections of the effects of global warming.
However, in spite of this specification, these dramatizations feel a bit heavy- handed in their demolition of famous landscapes — Coney Island submerged in water, the Sydney opera house burning, Las Vegas covered in sand.
What was so effective about the film was less its apocalyptic imagery and more its focus on the actual present and the problems of today. The archivist considers the next few years leading up to 2015 and dubs them the formative time in human history when we had the chance to mitigate the negative effects of climate change.
The film insists that people now could instate a policy that would cut carbon emissions 80 percent by 2050, only allowing the temperature to rise two more degrees. The challenge: “questioning collective values” that fuel excess and restructuring society to achieve this goal.
Unsurprisingly, the film hits the oil companies hard, presenting alarming statistics about oil consumption and specifically showing the cultural and environmental devastation that a Shell oil drilling project brought to a community in Nigeria.
Yet, just as importantly, “The Age of Stupid” condemns the ignorance of the general public, claiming that “the government will only go as far as its populations demands.”
In the segment that follows Mark Lynas, the British environmentalist, Lynas meets paralyzing resistance as he fights for clearance while setting up a wind turbine project.
The people of the town ultimately reject the idea because they fear that the project will depreciate the value of their homes by obscuring the view of the English countryside.
At this point, the archivist returns to the scene and states: “It’s like looking through binoculars, observing people on a far off beach […] fixated on the small area of sand under their feet as a tsunami races towards the shore.” His comment is perfectly timed. The material is painful to watch, and his words, ominous.
The Archivist finishes his video log by bestowing his information upon whomever finds it, offering it as a cautionary tale. Hope for the audience, then, lies in stepping away from the film experience, knowing that it is not yet 2055 and now is the time to effect change.
‘Age of Stupid’ delivers urgent message
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