Please note, this article reveals key elements about the end of the film… and the end of the century.
A fiction that unfortunately recalls reality? The film Don’t Look Up: Cosmic Denial is available since December 24 on Netflix. It recounts the discovery, by two scientists (played by Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence) of a comet heading straight for our planet and whose collision will cause the extinction of life. He then describes the inaction of politicians and society in the face of this alert. A substantiated scientific observation, a global threat, control strategies taking time to be put in place… All this soon echoed the climate crisis. The director himself noted this obvious connection: “Remember, after watching Don’t Look Up, that we have the science to solve the climate crisis”, exclaimed Adam McKay on Twitter (in English). So, does the film work as a metaphor for climate inaction? Franceinfo goes around several topics covered in the feature film with specialists.
On the comet as a metaphor for climate change
In the film, the discovered comet poses a threat to humanity. Just like climate change which, according to the latest report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), is causing a “change in extremes such as heat waves, heavy rainfall, droughts and tropical cyclones”, in all regions of the world, as shown in its atlas of the consequences of the phenomenon. “This metaphor teaches us that the end of the world is not because of the meteorite. We could have gotten rid of it! The end of the world is caused by the dysfunction of our institutions”, notes Jean-Paul Vanderlinden, professor of environmental studies at the University of Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines. And the IPCC report dated August underlined it well: the human influence on climate change, through greenhouse gas emissions, is “unequivocal”. “There, the metaphor almost works”, adds the researcher.
“Almost”, because it adds limits. “A metaphor that does not free itself from the context it passes through loses its force, because the characteristic of a metaphor is its universality”, he notes, citing as an example the American president (played by Meryl Streep) and her supporters, a clear reference to the “Trumpism”. “The spectator will look at many things and his judgment on this unacceptable situation will be deflected towards microsituations”, he regrets. He adds that a comet that hits Earth and wipes out humanity poses a different threat.
“For the first, we erase brutally, the level of suffering is quite low. In the film, people deny and then suffer for a few days or a few hours. But climate change will impose a lot of pain for a long time. People will lose their crops , will have to move… It’s another form of existential risk.”
Jean-Paul Vanderlinden, professor of environmental studiesat franceinfo
The responsibility at the origin of the phenomenon is also simplified: if no one is responsible for the arrival of a comet, “climate change is due to human influence, but with a different historical responsibility depending on the country”, notes Valérie Masson-Delmotte, co-president of the IPCC.
On the media treatment of the crisis
A television program that begins with popular news rather than a threat to humanity, a treatment that is intended “fun and light”, a disparagement of scientific personalities… In the film, the media evoke the alert, although supported by evidence, in a superficial way. “It reminds me of over a decade ago when a famous journalist told me that the problem with climate change was that it wasn’t funny and entertaining enough,” noted on Twitter (in English) Naomi Oreskes, science historian and author of The Merchants of Doubt. Climatologist Valérie Masson-Delmotte also regrets that “During debates on television, we don’t always look for the time to explain, but for the little phrase that will make people react”.
However, the media treatment is not so caricatural, nuance Jean-Baptiste Comby, social science researcher at the University of Paris 2, who has worked on the media treatment of the climate issue. “The scientific word remains, in a large majority of the media, a word of authority, considered. The various alerts occupy a non-negligible place”, he believes. We are therefore far from “fun and light”. However, he specifies that the relationship with scientists is not the same “between written press, radio and television” and “the media logic staged in the film corresponds more to those of the United States than to those of France, which are significantly different”.
On the reactions of the political class
The references to reality are obvious. “The mother-son relationship parodies Donald Trump’s father-daughter relationship”, notes Jean-Paul Vanderlinden. Valérie Masson-Delmotte underlines another visible aspect in Don’t Look Up : lack of knowledge of the subject by decision-makers. “I was struck by the few leaders who had read the latest IPCC report”, she explains.
The “political gains” that can motivate executive action are also well represented. While she does not want to solve the problem, the American president suddenly takes an interest in it when it is of interest to her popularity rating. Also non-fiction “the action often depends on the opportunities of the political calendar and serves when it is necessary to gain points”, says Lola Vallejo, director of the climate program at the Institute for Sustainable Development and International Relations (IDDRI). “The fight against climate change follows back-and-forth movements: France was highlighted on the international scene when Donald Trump was in withdrawal. And there, during this presidential campaign, the subject is very little discussed. ” Still, the film is essentially about the American political class.
“There is not a single scene on international negotiations. The UN is transparent, the European continent invisible. We do not see any developing countries.”
Lola Vallejo, director of the climate program at IDDRIat franceinfo
In Don’t Look Up, there is also no mention of the Houses of Parliament, an opposition or militant circles… “Everything that allows you to act in reality is absent”, regrets Valérie Masson-Delmotte. “It gives very little to see democratic life. How is an action strategy debated? Discussing together is nevertheless central to the climate…”
On the technology proposed as a solution
In the film, the strategy put in place to divert the trajectory of the comet is destroyed by the greed of a billionaire (Mark Rylance). He designs a second plan, based on an unproven technology, but from which he would derive benefits. “It leads to dithering and failure. It’s a parable of one of the discourses of inaction today: technological optimism”, describes Valérie Masson-Delmotte.
Geo-engineering, “green” planes, carbon capture… So many technologies sometimes presented as miracle solutions, just like the robots of the multinational Bash in the film. The feature film “just aim” with this technophile character who has the ear of the political elites, believes Lola Vallejo. “We are confronted every day with this discourse on the opportunities, on these sources for economic growth before even talking about the risks”, adds the specialist in climate negotiations. She cites the example of Bill Gates, who “advocates solutions linked to technologies when we should rather question our production and consumption model”.
On the experience of scientists
Since its broadcast, several climatologists have applauded the film. “As a climatologist doing all I can to raise awareness and prevent the destruction of the planet, this is the most accurate film I have seen about society’s lack of response to the deterioration of the climate. “, commented to the Guardian American climatologist Peter Kalmus. “This film is unquestionably a powerful metaphor for the ongoing climate crisis”, commented to the World another scientist from across the Atlantic, Michael E. Mann.
Just like the heroes of the film, “we weren’t listened to at the start”, abounds the climatologist Jean Jouzel. “In France, we have suffered a lot from the climate-skepticism of part of the scientific community itself, like Claude Allègre, who has done everything to deny the reality of global warming and human responsibility in this phenomenon”, he explains to HuffPost. For Valerie Masson-Delmotte, Don’t Look Up echoed his own experience: “I felt some of the difficulties that the scientists in the film experience. Speaking out in the scientific community does not prepare you to speak out clearly in the media or in front of circles of power”, she reports. A testimony that recalls the lessons of communication (the media training) mentioned in Don’t Look Up.