26 Nov 2008
Film Review: “Blind Spot”
Review of ‘Blind Spot’ DVD. 2008. Dislexic Productions. Directed by Adolfo Doring.
Any new peak oil film is inevitably going to be judged in the context of the films that have gone before it. Blind Spot is no exception. Does it offer any new insights or any new way of telling the story that previous examples of the genre haven’t? The answer, unfortunately, is no. In fact, I have to say that my despite being, as we have probably established by now, fascinated by the whole subject, I struggled to keep my eyes open for the full 88 minutes of the film.
Despite its very high production values, the format of Blind Spot becomes fairly stultifying after a while. Talking head after talking head (including many of your favourites, Heinberg, Deffeyes, Catton, Jensen, Tainter, a veritable cavalcade of peakists, doomers and catastrophists, all of whom are excellent), tell the peak oil story and why it matters, overlaid firstly with images of industrial society, and then with images of Nature and the environment. That’s it really, and there is not enough in that to sustain the viewer’s interest for an hour and a half (it certainly didn’t sustain mine).
I also struggled with the film’s basic premise. As the back cover blurb puts it “… we have put ourselves at a crossroad which offers two paths, both with dire consequences. If we continue to burn fossil fuels we will choke the life out of the planet, and if we don’t our way of life will collapse”. Really, if there is no thinking of any way through, or any way forward, or indeed if our ‘way of life’ changing substantially is seen as an utterly dreadful option, then for me at least, this film has nothing to offer.
Does it have End of Suburbia’s in your face, earth-shattering analysis of our oil dependency and the kick in the pants peak oil will give us? No. Does it have Crude Awakening’s powerful narrative about how the Oil Age has destroyed environments around the world and led to our perilous state of addiction? No. Does it have What a Way to Go’s sensitive exploration of how peak oil and the impacts it will have on society are affecting us all, allowing us to sit in the place of really feeling how all this affects us? No. Does it even have the compelling if slightly hallucinagenic feel of Imposed by Nature, which feels almost like a Burroughs-esque peak oil road movie? No. It is pretty much bereft of narrative, it doesn’t really tell a story at all.
Blind Spot felt to me like a collection of out-takes from End of Suburbia and What a Way to Go spliced together with some stock (albeit rather beautiful) footage of nature scenes. My sense is that peak oil films, especially if they are to distinguish themselves from those that have gone before them, need to tell a powerful story, they need to shock, or to inform with a fresh perspective, or they need to uplift and inspire with possibilities. This film does none of the above. Whereas Crude Impact tried to be 8 different films at once and ended up doing none of them very well, Blind Spot feels like it is struggling to even work out what kind of film it wants to be.
It is important to say that I am writing this from the perspective of having seen many such films on the peak oil subject, from the life-changing to the dreadful. It is therefore impossible for me to speak from the viewpoint of someone who has never seen a film on peak oil before, and how this film would come across to them. I suspect they would find it mildly interesting for the first half an hour, but then they would start to lose interest, and this is a subject in which it is vital that people don’t lose interest.
The recent film Age of Stupid (previewed at the Transition Network conference) did a great job of telling several stories in such a way as to weave a compelling narrative. It had drama, pace and ambition (although it was also pretty unremittingly focused on the problem rather than what we might do about it), all of which are missing from this film. The other thing that is fascinating to observe is that when you make a film about peak oil, unless you also look at responses and implications, you will end up with an almost exclusively male cast, as Blind Spot does. The interviewees are an esteemed, wise, but rather predictable collection, it would have been good to see some less often heard voices (when, for example, will we see a film with Sharon Astyk in it?).
So would I recommend it as a film you might like to show in your Transition groups? Sorry, not really. You might find it useful to show certain clips, certain sections from it which discuss different aspects you find interesting, but as a call-to-arms, as a powerful immersion in the challenges coming our way, as an invitation to be a part of creating the post-peak world, or even as something to scare you out of your wits, Blind Spot is a pretty unsatisfying and un-nourishing experience.
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You can see a trailer for Blind Spot and order copies of the DVD here. The film’s official website is here.
Mike Grenville
26 Nov 10:01am
I can’t disagree with your analysis.
Amanda
6 Dec 5:41am
There is a reality behind every story.
Click on the links and make up your own mind.
Adolfo Doring
6 Dec 5:57am
Hey Dr. Strangelove, if you want to hear something to scare you out of your wits how about this:
PERIMETER.
What are you going to do about protecting ‘Baile Dulra Teoranta’, when the other 6,499,999,999 people in the planet want to eat your potatos and your children? You couldn’t even build a house without it getting torched to the ground. Man you make me feel safe already, I’m buying a one way ticket to Teoranta tomorrow.
I’m glad you found your niche and for the first time in your life you are slightly ahead of the curve, but don’t let that inflate your ego, stick to gardening, which is what you know.
By the way the father of Peak Oil is Marion King Hubbert not Colin Campbell.
P.S. There is not a single frame of stock footage in Blind Spot but that is besides the point, what matters most is in the content.
Amanda Zackem
7 Dec 4:47pm
Mr. Hopkins,
While everyone is entitled to their opinion, your review is quite disheartening since you’re allegedly a person trying to help people understand WHAT peak oil is as well as all the facets that surround the issue. Correct? You realize that many people don’t even understand what peak oil is, let alone that everything surrounding us is made from and by oil.
Mr. Hopkins not every film is made to think for the viewer. Some films are made just to begin a dialogue and thought process. Not every film is created to “lead” the viewer into a happy euphoric place or give “all the answers”. People must think for themselves. Maybe our film has nothing to offer for you, but it may for others who haven’t been permaculturing most of their lives and haven’t even begun the process of understanding the absolute mess our world is in.
Why you wouldn’t want to help promote any and every film about peak oil whether you thought it was action packed or boring as hell, defies all logic.
You’ve made me realize why positive movements get stalled and I find it really sad.
It is particularly telling that you moderate anything and everything that ends up in this forum, giving it quite a fascistic tone. What are you afraid of?
For anyone else reading this, I encourage you to make up your own mind. These are some comments about the film:
Howard Zinn’s Review of Blind Spot: “BLIND SPOT is a fascinating documentary it draws on some of the most impressive scientific minds to educate us about our role in saving the earth, the water, the air and the lives of our children. I was transfixed by it.”
”Beautiful, crucial, straightforward, brilliantly woven images, words and music.”
-John Stauber, author of “Toxic Sludge Is Good for You”
“If we lived in a rational world, inhabited by rational human beings, viewing Blind Spot would be a mandatory prerequisite to taking any federal oath of office in the coming year. Were that to happen, there might be hope that the USA would resume world leadership and our renewed influence would be used to redirect ourselves and the world away from the unsustainable path upon which we plummeted along throughout the 20th century, mistakenly regarding the adventure as unmitigated progress. “
-William Catton Jr., author of Overshoot,
Professor Emeritus of Sociology at Washington StateUniversity
http://www.blindspotdoc.com
Sincerely,
Amanda Zackem
Producer of Blind Spot
Rob
7 Dec 9:37pm
Dear Adolfo and Amanda
I appreciate that you didn’t like my review of ‘Blind Spot’. I would imagine though that as makers of films you would be used to having your work reviewed, so I am somewhat startled to see such a strong and aggressive response to my criticisms of your film.
As the author of ‘Transition Handbook’, I have seen many reviews of the book, from the glowing to the US reviewer who described it is ‘appalling, dangerous and misguided’. Never though, have I written personal abuse to any reviewer, and I am somewhat appalled that you have chosen to do so to me. To write “you couldn’t even build a house without it getting torched to the ground” is utterly below the belt as a reponse to a review you didn’t like, and I think an apology is called for.
I reviewed the film because several people had asked me what I thought of it. My review set out my thoughts on it, in a way that was an honest setting out of my reaction to it.
Amanda wrote “why you wouldn’t want to help promote any and every film about peak oil whether you thought it was action packed or boring as hell, defies all logic”. If we are now all supposed to rave about any film, book or website just because it mentions peak oil, then that is a rather sad state of affairs.
The output on this subject varies hugely in quality, reliability and accessibility, and I, for one, refuse to glowingly enthuse about everything, just in the interests of promoting a message. As a community that shares an interest, and as people building a body of reliable information, to do so would be reprehensible.
Some output on the peak oil issue (and I don’t include Blind Spot in this) can actually be harmful to the debate, and having some degree of discernment is essential in my opinion. Also, as someone who recommends films that people starting a Transition initiative might screen to 100 people who turn up from their community, on which their opinion of that initiative will be based, yes it is important that the film they show is reliable, informative, compelling and is able to hold their attention. Whether or not it leads people to Amanda’s “happy euphoric place” is neither here nor there.
In terms of Transition Culture being moderated, yes it is, like most blogs. That is mostly so you don’t have to read endless posts containing links to ‘nipple slips’ and ‘hairy shemales’ which I have to wearily delete every day. Also because sometimes people do write in comments that are beyond the standards of mutual respect and good grace that I try to promote here.
Having said that, in the 3 years of Transition Culture, I have only refused to publish 3 or 4 comments, hardly fascistic, and that was because they were offensive towards other readers, or because they were self-promoting to an unacceptable degree. If any readers feel this website has ‘quite a fascistic tone’ I would like to hear from them. I can’t think of a less appropriate criticism for the site myself, other than ‘relentlessly depressing’.
Adolfo, my review didn’t mention Colin Campbell, not quite sure where that came from. Sorry you didn’t like the review, but if you make a product and put it into the world seeking reviews, and you don’t like those reviews and feel the need to respond in such a vitriolic way, then maybe you shouldn’t make films. I’m sure lots of people will like it, and will write glowing reviews, I didn’t like it, and wrote what I thought was a pretty balanced review.
Such is the way of the world. I wish you all the best with the film, and with you and your team’s work spreading information about the challenge that peak oil inevitably poses to the world.
With best wishes
Rob
Adolfo Doring
8 Dec 5:10am
Rob
I have seen all the films you talk about with great adulation and I wouldn’t tell anyone to avoid watching any of them even if as a filmmaker I don’t find them exceptional. In the opening of your ‘review’ your single out Blind Spot as not being like any of the films that you like and there is a reason for that; I didn’t want to make the same film over again. Also, shock is not my style. Blind Spot analyses the questions that face humanity from the perspective of Peak Oil. It also bottlenecks the issues to the United States, where it is way more difficult to bring people into a conversation that goes directly counter to the American Dream and Manifest Destiny.
As for the write up in the back of the DVD it means to illustrate the peril we are in. It is unquestionable that if we stop using fossil fuels our way of life would collapse and if we continue the ecological impact will do us in (ie. The gulf-stream shutting down). Localization is great but it is not enough that a few towns do it, again the problem of Perimeter arises.
The only real solution is a rethinking on a global scale of what it means to be the human race, spinning around the sun in the only planet we’ll ever know. Blind Spot does not offer cheap and quick answers because we didn’t want to give false hope to people. As Derrick Jensen says in the film: “Rational people will go to the end of the world as long as you allow them to believe that buying energy saving bulbs is going to save the planet.”
Besides that there are some like Albert Bartlett and Bill Catton who offer solutions, however both concern leadership in a national scale. However it is only possible to influence leadership in a national scale using the three tools that you have done away with in your (youtube) interview: activism, lobbying and protest.
Which brings me to the following point:
Adolfo, my review didn’t mention Colin Campbell, not quite sure where that came from.
It came from here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQF09NG00V8
I just watched the whole (shabby) interview and I must admit that you have done a good job of memorizing everyone’s talking points and with the exception of the quote by Jean Dubuffet, there was not a single original perspective in 54 minutes.
To write “you couldn’t even build a house without it getting torched to the ground” is utterly below the belt as a response to a review you didn’t like, and I think an apology is called for.
It is not a response to a review I didn’t like, because first of all you are not a reviewer. You are a guy who finds himself in the middle of a situation where people are listening to him, probably for the first time in his life. So the apology is more due from you to those who heed to your opinions.
Ultimately the comment on the burnt house is not so much an assessment of your capacity to get things done as it is a way to point out the reality that when people wish to bring about change they face forces beyond the purely ecological. Blockers, you might call them.
The output on this subject varies hugely in quality, reliability and accessibility, and I, for one, refuse to glowingly enthuse about everything, just in the interests of promoting a message. As a community that shares an interest, and as people building a body of reliable information, to do so would be reprehensible.
Thank you sir, may I have another.
P.S. There is not an iota of unreliable information in Blind Spot. If there is, please point it out.
Besides no one is suggesting that you should endorse everything, but getting in the way of a film like Blind Spot is counter to the benevolent philosophy you espouse.
Sorry you didn’t like the review, but if you make a product and put it into the world seeking reviews, and you don’t like those reviews and feel the need to respond in such a vitriolic way, then maybe you shouldn’t make films.
When I make a film (and peak oil is not the only subject matter of my films) I don’t put it out into the world seeking reviews. I put it out on the world seeking an audience. And that audience can then make up their own mind about what the film has to say. I like for the film to have an effect on them at a visceral level, in the dark, with as little filters in between.
From your YouTube interview:
“You create historic events where people can say ‘that’s when it all started’.”
That was the second mention of trying to fit your self into some kind of historical event. Can I suggest a bronze sculpture of you at least 16 feet tall in the middle of your transition town’s square, with the following inscribed between golden wreaths:
Rob Hopkins – Founding Father of the Post Carbon World.
Best
Adolfo
Amanda Zackem
8 Dec 5:48am
Rob,
It is a sad state of affairs when a Permaculturist decides to even take more then five second of his time to write a blog about how horrible he finds a documentary this is within his own movement. Your time could have been spent exposing anti-peak oil propaganda or speaking out against those who believe that what both you and I are doing is complete bullshit and a lie.
Why don’t you ask some of the interviewees in the film if what they said wasn’t reliable information? I’m sure Professor Catton, Richard Heinberg, Derrick Jensen, Albert Bartlett, Joseph Tainter, Kenneth Deffeyes, David Pimental, David Korten, Elke Weber, Max Fraad Wolff, Terry Tamminen, Bill Mckibben, Lester Brown, James Hansen, Roscoe Bartlett, Mary Anne Hitt, Jason Bradford and Matt Savinar, wouldn’t agree with you. They may even consider your comment completely unintelligent.
A body of reliable information is that of the truth and our film speaks of the truth very eloquently. Why would a body of “reliable information” exclude a film so packed with information and insight.
It concerns me Rob, that you’ve put yourself in the position of being, as Bush would say, “the decider guy” on people’s attention span.
As for your moderation policy, it so happens that one of the three comments blocked was mine, a mere two sentences suggesting people go to http://www.blindspotdoc and make up their own minds.
Steve
4 Feb 11:23pm
As an activist myself, I sympathize with the other commenters here about the reviewer’s lack of support for his ideological comrades. Couldn’t he have found *something* positive to say about this movie? Surely it has *some* role to play? Yes, there were a lot of clichés, this was still a nice propaganda piece, if not for thinking people.
However, not being a member of this ideological camp, I am free to express my opinion, which is even less positive. I saw Blind Spot in Moscow as part of a European Film Festival, and I was prevailed upon to lead the post-film discussion. We only had time to watch the first half, so maybe the approach changed in the second half, but I doubt it. I detest this sort of documentary: their goal is not to educate, nor even to persuade, but to program. The film consists of a relentless parade of “experts” all sharing the same ideology, interspersed among somber footage of energy being. As the makers themselves say, their opinion is “common sense”, so why present any opposing views? Well, maybe so as to eliminate some of the most obvious fallacies, which a few decent economists could have done.
One of the experts was Lester Brown, founder of the Worldwatch Institute. A couple decades ago, this chicken-little doomsayer was spouting the “common sense” that overpopulation was a grave threat to the world. Now we’re worried about population decline. They showed a scary population chart, scaled to show dramatic exponential growth in recent times (that’s a property of exponential curves, at all points). The sad thing about these doomsayers is that they think of people like the Chinese as locusts: consumers, not producers. I look at them not as mouths but as brains, more *resources* to help us find solutions.
Peak oil? Even before the 2008 financial crisis popped the asset and oil bubble, anyone who understands economics and feedback loops would have dismissed the concerns over energy consumption. A September 2008 cover of Fortune Magazine had a headline “$500 a barrel oil?” At the beginning of 2009, the price is around $40. Scarcity means high prices, and the price of oil has been amazingly stable for over 60 years:
http://www.inflationdata.com/inflation/Inflation_Rate/Historical_Oil_Prices_Chart.asp
It rises only temporarily, as a result of shocks.
Energy is already expensive enough that we keep working to economize. Today we use half as much per unit of production as we did 20 years ago. We invent new energy-efficient light bulbs. We keep gradually improving alternative energy sources. What we need are more brains on the problem, like those Chinese. What we don’t need is subsidized ethanol.
This is finite-resources thinking is the same sort of fallacy that led Paul Ehrlich to make his famous (losing) wager of 1980 that commodity prices would rise over the next ten years:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon-Ehrlich_wager
The “experts” trotted out the same old clichés, like “the United States consumes X percent of the world’s resources” and “Detroit squashed the technology for electric vehicles”. As any decent economist would say, the US consumes X percent because it produces X percent (well, maybe it is borrowing a bit, but that will have to be repaid). Maybe you believe the Detroit conspiracies, but Tesla in Silicon Valley is developing electric cars, and so can anyone else not burdened by unions.
One truly bizarre “expert” asserted that societies collapse when they get too “complex”. Say what? Since when did complexity become inherently bad? Maybe societies collapse when they spend too much money on wars? Maybe organizations, like organisms, collapse when they become ridden with parasites?
Response to the director and reviewer about stock footage: maybe all the modern stuff was shot fresh, but there was a bit of historical video, entirely reasonable.
stingray
5 Feb 6:08pm
Blimey if they react like this to a little bit of criticism how are they going to cope when the big DIEOFF CATASTROPHE happens?
Seriously this analysis of peak oil/resource use is both weak,reductionist and can only lead to reactionary conclusions.
They see every new human born as only consisting of a mouth that can only take and consume. Whereas we arrive born with 2 arms that can contribute also.
I could go on but these two articles criticise the DIEOFF/TOO MANY PEOPLE argument better than i can:
John Bellamy Foster:
http://eserver.org/clogic/3-1&2/foster.html
and this:
Scarcity,Poverty,Apocalypse by iain boal
http://www.counterpunch.org/boal09112007.html
Graham Burnett
5 Feb 11:07pm
Stingray said > Blimey if they react like this to a little bit of criticism how are they going to cope when the big DIEOFF CATASTROPHE happens?
I was thinking of throwing a similar paddy when Rob was critical towards my book, but it only would have been a cheap ploy to bump it up to the top of the ‘recent comments’ list, so maybe I’ll wait a couple more weeks
Adolfo
5 Feb 11:26pm
Steve
What festival in Moscow did you watch Blind Spot at? Also it is not clear if the festival only showed the first half or if you only watched the first half.
Adolfo
Victoria K-M
6 Feb 9:59pm
Adolfo,
I’m trying to run the screening of the 4th EFF’s films in Moscow. Please, send me an e-mail and ask me any questions about the screening.
I will be happy to answer to the question: ‘Steve
What festival in Moscow did you watch Blind Spot at? Also it is not clear if the festival only showed the first half or if you only watched the first half.
Adolfo’
Sincerely,
Victoria
Amanda Zackem
7 Feb 10:10pm
Hi Victoria,
Adolfo and I would like to know the name of the festival is screened in and how we can reach you via email or phone.
blindspotdoc@yahoo.com
Best,
Amanda
David Giancarlo
8 Feb 10:51pm
Stingray said > Blimey if they react like this to a little bit of criticism how are they going to cope when the big DIEOFF CATASTROPHE happens
Agreed completely
steve
17 Feb 11:53pm
Ahem, well ignoring the above, I would like to say that we screened this in Sheffield last night to an admittedly small audience, but the impression was that most people think this was a really good movie. One person thought this was one of the best peak oil movies along with “Power of Community” and “What a Way to Go” and he’s seen most of them. Someone else wants to see it again and someone else said it needs to be seen by a bigger audience (we had crap publicity). I’ve also shown it a to a few friends and again the only response has been very positive.
As an introduction to peak oil I’d make it a first choice since it’s well filmed, got very interesting and qualified speakers (one person picked up on this last night) and it’s better than End of Suburbia (also good) which is primarily about US suburbia and the theory that suburbia will disappear is much less certain than a lot of other stuff about peak oil.
It is a little similar to ‘What a Way to Go’ but that’s a much more personal film. This will get the message across to more mainstream audiences. It also covers different stuff. I found the economist guy very interesting, also Jason Bradford and Albert Bartlett. Joseph Tainter’s ideas are interesting and I’d have liked to hear more from him but I guess you can only get so much in.
After our failure to get a bigger audience we’re now looking to get this shown in a local cinema too. Fingers crossed.
So anyone thinking about this I’d say definitely check it out. It’s not perfect, but it is still a very good film.
steve (Transition Sheffield)
Mike B
7 Apr 5:43am
Holy tantrums!
I wanted to check this film out, but I’m amazed by the reactionary remarks from Amanda and Adolfo. Rob didn’t like the film. Get over it. You don’t have to try to belittle the man with insensitive remarks. He didn’t suggest that the film contains faulty information, just that it didn’t hold his attention or put a new spin on the issue.
Adolfo appears to be going to great lengths to discredit the Transition Towns initiative, and I’m not quite sure why. Will TTs avert the coming storm? Probably not, but it’s worth a shot. And it’s a lot more fun than being miserable, waiting patiently for the elites to embrace a “rethinking on a global scale of what it means to be the human race.”
Lastly, Adolfo appears to be really scraping the barrel when he suggests that Rob is not a qualified reviewer. Is there a special course that one needs to take before being able to comment-positively or negatively-on a film? What makes Howard Zinn a qualified reviewer and not Rob?
Best of luck with the film, but you guys seriously need to chill out.
Brendan Barrett
1 May 5:00am
Oh, just discovered this thread and after we had also reviewed Blind Spot. To be honest, I am a bit surprised by tone of these discussions but nevermind.
I have watched Blindspot and my colleague just reviewed it – http://ourworld.unu.edu/en/2009/04/28/blind-spot/
My overall impression about the difference between Blind Spot and the others that Rob mentions,is that Blind Spot digs deeper on the psychology of the human condition that got us into and keeps us in this mess.
It does this without the use of a “god-like” narrator, letting the story tell itself. That is a huge challenge in film-making but it appears to work in Blind Spot.
To be honest, after watching the “End of Suburbia” I was in state of shock and somewhat depressed. But after Blind Spot, I felt differently (accepted I seen more peak oil documentaries by now). I had the impression that the more light that we shed on this blind spot, the greater potential we have to move towards a solution.
I also greatly admire the work of the Transition Town movement and believe it is a major contribution to the solutions we will need sooner rather than later. Both the Blind Spot documentary and Transition Towns are very important for the hope and vision they provide.
But we all know that hope and vision are no substitute from real change, and there needs to be much, much more of that.