It’s an old philosophy to leave the world in a better state than when you found it. Admirable, yet few of us can truly attest that the world has benefitted from our brief tenure. Sure, you might have family and friends who will mourn you for a generation or two, but via our carbon footprint alone, our individual impacts have historically been a bit of a drain.
While the scales haven’t quite tipped yet, in recent decades the (occasionally ignorant) harm we have wrought on the planet has been addressed by more and more impassioned people; everyday folks inspired to step up against industrial forces to halt the irreparable damage being done to our environment. Greenpeace has become synonymous with these efforts, and as the documentary How To Change The World is unveiled across the world, environmentalist and filmmaker Emily Hunter is already following in the footsteps of her late father, Bob Hunter; activist, journalist, and co-founder of Greenpeace.
“[Jerry Rothwell] did an amazing job. Really he was the director of a seven-year history that has a different story depending on who you talk to,” laughs Emily. “My family is over the moon. It was a dream of my father’s that stretches back 35, 40 years ago. He had wanted to tell this story, but at that time getting the finances meant turning it into a Hollywood film. Documentary didn’t quite have the same flair and mainstream appeal that it does today. So this story of the original Greenpeace pioneers has been trying to be told long before I was born, because Dad knew this was a story of ordinary people doing the extraordinary, and that it would inspire people. But through different producers and different celebrities, nothing ever happened.
“We actually thought the project was cursed for the longest time. It wasn’t until a couple of years after my father passed away that this director met with us and pitched the idea of a documentary. We felt a good trust with him, and I truly feel he made a masterpiece.”
The success of the movie notwithstanding, the legacy of Greenpeace – and similar movements such as Sea Shepherd and the World Wildlife Fund – remains stronger than ever. Never before has outrage at the degradation of natural environments and the decimation of animal populations been so vocal, and this is thanks in no small part to the gargantuan rise of communication technologies. It is certainly a far different landscape to the 1971 protest against atomic testing in Alaska that the film investigates.
“It really shows what pioneers they were, because they really didn’t have much,” says Emily. “A 16-millimetre camera, a few canisters of film they could maybe capture a few minutes on. That was pretty much it. Once you got the shot, you kind of ran back to the boat to get back to land and show the world. They were really pretty archaic tools that they were using, and yet they still understood the power of those tools to create a much more immense change in the world.
“Today, in a way I think we’re spoilt, but we also have much more of an ability because our tools are way more democratic. It’s not the broadcast era where a few elite get those controls, who decide what images, decide who gets what story out there.
“Now it’s the average person, and we’re seeing much more citizen journalism evoking conversation, leaking information and sparking social movement, because they’re capturing things that would otherwise go unnoticed. And that’s a very powerful tide, and I think that’s why we are seeing a rise in social movements. The marketing of those stories is possible in a way that never existed before.”
While Emily acted as researcher for the film, and is herself deeply entrenched in the conservationist movement (even finding herself taken hostage after protesting on the Galápagos Islands), this remains the deeply personal story of her father, who passed away in 2005. As such, the documentary stands as an informative call-to-action, but also as a poignant familial reminder.
“It’s been hard, and the first couple of times I couldn’t watch the whole thing. There are still parts now that will make me cry. I love it, but at a personal level it’s just hard, because the footage is so raw and real, it really takes you back into the ’70s. And my father’s voice – even when it’s told through an actor – his writing is so clear through that narration, it feels like a piece of my dad has come back alive. It’s really quite bittersweet. But I’m glad, of course, that it’s happened. This is the story he was always trying to tell, and it’s finally able to be shared to the public. Because I do see such an impact with people young and old who see this film, and that’s what he wanted.
“I think it’s in the consciousness of people all around the world, because we’re facing those realities now. We’re no longer in a time when we just protest something, we’re at a time where we’re trying to heal the issues that we face. There is a larger underground, and whether you call yourself an activist or an environmentalist, I think those terms don’t need to apply. I think there are so many people out there who want to make a difference, small or large. And that force, that humanity, that’s what gives me hope.”
How To Change The World (dir. Jerry Rothwell) is in cinemas Thursday September 17.
