The Red, White, and Green

This has been the summer of the eco documentary: Food, Inc. exposes the horrific inner workings of our nation’s food industry; The End of the Line brings light to the catastrophic overfishing of our oceans; and The Cove reveals the senseless slaughtering of 26,000 dolphins a year in Taiji, Japan. And while many at this point may be experiencing a bit of green film fatigue, I’m going to add another one to your must-see list, because it so perfectly encapsulates how we even reached this crisis point at all. The film is called Earth Days.

Directed by Academy Award- and Emmy-nominated director Robert Stone, Earth Days traces the birth of the modern environmental movement — from Rachel Carson‘s provocative and prophetic best-seller Silent Spring through the organization of the first Earth Day celebration in 1970. The film features moving narrative from nine of its pioneers, including Stewart Udall, who served as secretary of the interior in the Kennedy and Johnson administrations; Apollo 9 astronaut Rusty Schweickart; and renewable energy pioneer Hunter Lovins.

The film’s breathtakingly beautiful visuals of our planet and remarkable footage from the ’50s and ’60s (much of it in color; you won’t see such a vivid depiction of the era outside of Mad Men) are worth the price of admission alone. But what struck me most about Earth Days is how so much environmental change was effected — and then subsequently lost — in a relatively few short decades, and how little I (an environmentalist) actually know about this history.

As a child of the ’80s, I had always assumed that the eco-activist movement was a fringe one; growing up, environmental matters were rarely mentioned in the political arena or as a top concern of everyday Americans, and were relegated to the bottom of the issue list — below terrorism and Iraq and the economy and the “declining morals” of American society. Caring about our planet was for tree huggers and veggie burger–eating types.

But this wasn’t always so. In Earth Days, we see that the environmental movement had become a powerful force in the early ’70s: A whopping 10 percent of the US population organized and marched for the first Earth Day in 1970. Environmental action was embraced by Republicans and Democrats alike (former Republican Congressman Pete McCloskey is featured in the film), and a slew of progressive legislation followed — the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, and Endangered Species Act. President Carter even had solar panels installed on the roof of the White House. But then, the political culture suddenly changed, and with it went support for the environmental coalition; in 1986, President Regan had the solar panels removed and they were never replaced. 

How did so many of us forget this? How did we not see the interconnectedness of it all?

Now, nearly 30 years later, the environmental force for change has finally, once again, reached critical mass, and we now have the political landscape and the American will to truly shift the direction of this country — and the world. But we can’t afford to squander another day: Earth Days, and its poignant lesson of how quickly we could lose it all again, should be required watching for us all.

–Jennifer Grayson

Earth Days opens today. Find a theater near you. 

Related posts:
The Huffington Post: The Cove: Why Is the Japanese Government Hell-Bent on Killing Dolphins?
The Red, White, and Green: Go see: The End of the Line
The Red, White, and Green: Eco date night: Go see Food, Inc.

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