Hot Docs highlights interesting new documentaries we’ve recently added to our collection.
The Hungry Tide (DVD 10632) makes us think about global climate change from the perspective of those who might be the most affected. We may still be estimating the realistic chances of those coastline projections from An Inconvenient Truth happening, but for the people of Kiribati, the threat of rising coastlines is immediate and frightening. The film uses a personal approach, telling the stories of a few specific people affected by climate change rather than pure science.
Official description from the film’s website:
The central Pacific nation of Kiribati is one of the countries in the world most vulnerable to climate change. Sea level rise and increasing salinity are threatening the lives of 105,000 people spread over 33 atolls in this remote corner of the Pacific. It’s the same ocean, which for generations has sustained the country that is now the source of its destruction.
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The latest prognosis for climate change appears grim. Pledges made by industrialized countries at the Copenhagen and Cancun Climate Change Conferences to cut carbon emissions have fallen far short of their targets. Scientists currently predict temperature increases of between 3 and 6 degrees, and sea level rises of well over a metre, by the turn of the century. Only decisive global action will save Kiribati and its culture from disappearing.