{"id":37415,"date":"2015-12-01T12:28:49","date_gmt":"2015-12-01T20:28:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/?p=37415"},"modified":"2015-12-01T12:28:49","modified_gmt":"2015-12-01T20:28:49","slug":"darren-aronofsky-on-noah-and-the-environment-in-paris","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/2015\/12\/darren-aronofsky-on-noah-and-the-environment-in-paris.html","title":{"rendered":"Darren Aronofsky on Noah<\/i> and the environment in Paris"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"noah-aronofsky-crowe-b\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Darren Aronofsky is in Paris right now, taking part in a massive art project<\/a> for the climate talks there, and the New York Times<\/i> posted a short blurb<\/a> yesterday in which he referred to the environmental themes of his most recent movie, Noah<\/a><\/i>:
\n<\/p>\n

Mr. Aronofsky\u2019s most recent film, \u201cNoah,\u201d is about the biblical flood and humanity\u2019s failure to stop it. \u201cThere\u2019s a very important environmental message in it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cMost of the work I do outside of storytelling is work for environmental causes. When I was 16, I was really lucky to hook up with an organization called School for Field Studies. It\u2019s out of Salem, Mass., and they send high school students to environmentally fragile places around the world. One year I went with them to Kenya, and the following year to Prince William Sound<\/a>, where I studied thermal regulation and harbor seals. Two years later was the Exxon Valdez spill.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Times<\/i> reporter gets the point of the film slightly wrong, I think.<\/p>\n

For one thing, the flood is presented not as a consequence<\/i> of mankind\u2019s actions, but as something that is sent by God as a punishment<\/i> or remedy<\/i> for those actions.<\/p>\n

Thus, the film cannot be about \u201chumanity\u2019s failure to stop\u201d the flood, because the film never hints that it would even be possible for humanity to stop the flood. Indeed, the film strongly questions whether it would even be desirable<\/i> to stop the flood.<\/p>\n

More interesting to me is Aronofsky\u2019s statement that the film has \u201ca very important environmental message\u201d \u2014 because when I interviewed him<\/a> prior to the film\u2019s release, he explicitly said that his movie wasn\u2019t<\/i> \u201can environmental message film\u201d.<\/p>\n

Now, of course, many people involved in the making of Noah have<\/i> discussed how the film and its production were driven by environmental concerns, including:<\/p>\n