Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth"
Al Gore's documentary, "An Inconvenient Truth," is being shown at the State Theatre in Modesto. See show times below. It is about global warming.
We thank UC Merced Chancellor Carol Tomlinson-Keasey for mentioning at this week's Great Valley Center conference in Fresno that Gore's documentary is also being shown in Clovis. In keeping with the prevalent theme of denial of global warming, the chancellor said that "climate change" was the subject of the film. However, she again vowed that UC Merced would be environmentally sensitive, and talked at length about UC research into solar power.
Gore, who would have been elected president in 2000 if the president's brother had not been the governor of Florida, reminds us by the making of this film what we have lost since that election was decided in the US Supreme Court on a straight Party vote. We will have lost eight extremely critical years of attention to the environmental, and quite possibly more than 2,500 dead and 18,000 wounded US soldiers. What industry pollution standards have not been relaxed are planned to be relaxed, the US was not one of the 140 nations that ratified the Kyoto Protocol on Global Warming in 2005, the new Bush US Supreme Court just rendered a mischievous decision on the Clean Water Act that will be a boon to the legal profession, the House Resources Committee chaired by Rep. RichPAC Pombo, Buffalo Slayer-Tracy, has turned into a one-stop shop for natural resource exploitation, and Pombo and Rep. Dennis Cardoza, Shrimp Slayer-Merced have led a series of assaults on the Endangered Species Act that grow more radical with each passing year -- to name only a few of the glaring examples of the works of the present, illegal, anti-environmental, dynastic regime ruled by bribery and corruption, hell-bent for Armageddon.
The following is a sample of reviews of "An Inconvenient Truth." Since it doesn't seem to be showing in Merced, we're planning to go see it in Modesto and report more on it later.
Bill Hatch
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Scientists Give Gore Movie Five Stars for Accuracy
By Seth Borenstein
Associated Press
posted: 27 June 2006
04:34 pm ET
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The nation's top climate scientists are giving "An Inconvenient Truth,'' Al Gore's documentary on global warming, five stars for accuracy.
The former vice president's movie -- replete with the prospect of a flooded New York City, an inundated Florida, more and nastier hurricanes, worsening droughts, retreating glaciers and disappearing ice sheets -- mostly got the science right, said all 19 climate scientists who had seen the movie or read the book and answered questions from The Associated Press.
The AP contacted more than 100 top climate researchers by e-mail and phone for their opinion. Among those contacted were vocal skeptics of climate change theory. Most scientists had not seen the movie, which is in limited release, or read the book.
But those who have seen it had the same general impression: Gore conveyed the science correctly; the world is getting hotter and it is a manmade catastrophe-in-the-making caused by the burning of fossil fuels.
"Excellent,'' said William Schlesinger, dean of the Nicholas School of Environment and Earth Sciences at Duke University. "He got all the important material and got it right.''
Robert Corell, chairman of the worldwide Arctic Climate Impact Assessment group of scientists, read the book and saw Gore give the slideshow presentation that is woven throughout the documentary.
"I sat there and I'm amazed at how thorough and accurate,'' Corell said. "After the
presentation I said, `Al, I'm absolutely blown away. There's a lot of details you could get wrong.' ... I could find no error.''
Gore, in an interview with the AP, said he wasn't surprised "because I took a lot of care to try to make sure the science was right.''
The tiny errors scientists found weren't a big deal, "far, far fewer and less significant than the shortcoming in speeches by the typical politician explaining an issue,'' said Michael MacCracken, who used to be in charge of the nation's global warming effects program and is now chief scientist at the Climate Institute in Washington.
One concern was about the connection between hurricanes and global warming. That is a subject of a heated debate in the science community. Gore cited five recent scientific studies to support his view.
"I thought the use of imagery from Hurricane Katrina was inappropriate and unnecessary in this regard, as there are plenty of disturbing impacts associated with global warming for which there is much greater scientific consensus,'' said Brian Soden, a University of Miami professor of meteorology and oceanography.
Some scientists said Gore confused his ice sheets when he said the effect of the Clean Air Act is noticeable in the Antarctic ice core; it is the Greenland ice core. Others thought Gore oversimplified the causal-link between the key greenhouse gas carbon dioxide and rising temperatures.
While some nonscientists could be depressed by the dire disaster-laden warmer world scenario that Gore laid out, one top researcher thought it was too optimistic. Tom Wigley, senior scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, thought the former vice president sugarcoated the problem by saying that with already-available technologies and changes in habit -- such as changing light bulbs -- the world could help slow or stop global warming.
While more than 1 million people have seen the movie since it opened in May, that does not include Washington's top science decision makers. President Bush said he won't see it. The heads of the Environmental Protection Agency and NASA haven't seen it, and the president's science adviser said the movie is on his to-see list.
"They are quite literally afraid to know the truth,'' Gore said. "Because if you accept the truth of what the scientific community is saying, it gives you a moral imperative to start to rein in the 70 million tons of global warming pollution that human civilization is putting into the atmosphere every day.''
As far as the movie's entertainment value, Scripps Institution geosciences professor Jeff Severinghaus summed it up: "My wife fell asleep. Of course, I was on the edge of my chair.''
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'Inconvenient' doesn't duck harsh truths
By BETSY PICKLE, Scripps Howard News Service
Merced Sun-Star
Last Updated: June 15, 2006, 09:00:00 PM PDT
(SH) - Stop me if you think you've heard this one before: Humans are using so much energy and producing so much waste that they've thrown Earth's heating and cooling system out of whack, and within the foreseeable future, unless people change, the planet will become unfixable - and, sooner than it's comfortable to contemplate, it will become unlivable.
Not exactly a news flash, is it? But in "An Inconvenient Truth," the message takes on the urgency it deserves. Hurricanes, tornadoes, floods and melting ice shelves are only the most obvious of all the signs that should not be ignored.
"An Inconvenient Truth" is a documentary, but not one that tries to look at both sides of a debate. The point that director Davis Guggenheim wants to convey is that there is no debate, only facts, many of which have been impugned by spin masters.
Here to present the facts is Al Gore, the man who "used to be the next president of the United States," as Gore quips. Most of "Truth" is a film of Gore's slide show on global warming, a show he's presented hundreds of times through the years.
A film of a slide show? That sounds almost as scary as glaciers melting and causing the oceans to submerge New York and California. But this is not an ordinary slide show, nor is it an ordinary presenter.
Gore's song-and-dance routine puts visuals and data together in an entertaining way. It incorporates photos, film, even animation. Although he uses plenty of science - not just heartrending pictures of the world's most beautiful landscapes under assault from the ravages of mankind - Gore never sends viewers into that lecture-hall haze that afflicts so many in college.
In fact, if this charming, confident speaker had been on the campaign trail in 2000, the presidential election probably would not have been decided by the Supreme Court. Gore is in his element here, speaking passionately about something every human should be passionate about.
Guggenheim gets Gore to put his motivations in context with a few detours into his personal life. It's done with taste and never takes away from the heart of the film. Nor does the film come across like a political platform. This is a problem that everyone must solve.
As photographs take viewers from the Arctic to South America to Asia, and charts and graphs bluntly (and humorously) spell out the differences between cyclical weather patterns and the mess the world is in now, Gore calmly and rationally reassures the audience that there is still time to heal the hurting Earth.
"An Inconvenient Truth" contains bits and pieces most people have heard before, but it puts the big picture together so that it's impossible to miss. That's what this film should be - impossible to miss. Anyone who skips it is a coward.
Rated PG for mild thematic elements.
Five stars (out of five).
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Mercedsun-star.com
undated
Movies: PG
An Inconvenient Truth
Rated PG, for mild thematic elements. 100 min.
Humanity is sitting on a time bomb. If the vast majority of the world's scientists are right, we have just ten years to avert a major catastrophe that could send our entire planet's climate system into a tail-spin of epic destruction involving extreme weather, floods, droughts, epidemics and killer heat waves beyond anything we have ever experienced- a catastrophe of our own making. If that sounds like a recipe for serious gloom and doom -- think again. From director Davis Guggenheim comes the Sundance Film Festival hit, "An Inconvenient Truth," which offers a passionate and inspirational look at one man's commitment to expose the myths and misconceptions that surround global warming and inspire actions to prevent it. That man is former Vice President Al Gore, who, in the wake of defeat in the 2000 election, re-set the course of his life to focus on an all-out effort to help save the planet from irrevocable change. In this eye-opening and poignant portrait of Gore and his 'traveling global warming show,' Gore is funny, engaging, open and downright on fire about getting the surprisingly stirring truth about what he calls our 'planetary emergency' out to ordinary citizens before it's too late.
Director:
Davis Guggenheim
Cast:
Al Gore
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Local Showtimes
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Showing today at the following theaters:
Clovis - UA Movies 8 - Clovis
(11:50 AM) (2:10) (4:40) 7:10 9:40 PM
State Theatre of Modesto, Inc.
1307 J Street
Modesto, CA 95354
(209) 527-4697
fax (209) 523-0201
http://www.thestate.org/Home.cms?section=home
Dates & Times
Friday, June 30 - 6:00, 8:15 PM
Saturday, July 1 - 6:00, 8:15 PM
Sunday, July 2 - 3:00, 5:30 PM
Monday, July 3 - 7:00 PM
Tuesday, July 4 - 7:00 PM
Friday, July 7 - 6:00, 8:15 PM
Saturday, July 8 - 6:00, 8:15 PM
Sunday, July 9 - 3:00, 5:30 PM
Monday, July 10 - 7:00 PM
Tuesday, July 11 - 7:00 PM
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