New to DVD this week:
A PLASTIC OCEAN
Director:
Craig Leeson
Premiere:
Raindance 2016
Select Festivals:
Wildlife Conservation, Big Sky, Wild & Scenic, Barbados, Waimea Ocean Film Festival
About:
A journalist travels the world to explore the impact of plastic pollution.
Leeson, who serves as the film’s onscreen host, explains how he came to investigate our world’s plastic problem after fulfilling a lifetime’s dream to see the blue whale in its natural habitat. While on this whale watching expedition, he encountered some of the plastic waste that has been causing harm to ocean ecosystems for years now. This serves as the impetus to embark on a (likely not particularly environmentally-friendly) global odyssey to survey the dangers posed by our disposable-minded culture and plastic’s durability – not just on oceans but on land as well. Leeson and his collaborators, including free-diving champion Tanya Streeter, seen here delivering a TEDx talk, are clearly earnest, passionate advocates for humanity to change their ways, make better choices, and clean up the mess before it’s really too late for us all, but the film itself offers very little that hasn’t been explored in other documentary projects already with more focused and artful storytelling. Still, it’s a well-intentioned project that might help bring attention to an increasingly dire problem.
what (not) to doc 