- Movie depicting horrors of global warming could boost
votes for Democrat challenger Here's the pitch: a dullish candidate, outflanked
by his opponent's serious money, attacked for his liberal leanings, is
swept to an unlikely victory thanks to a blockbuster movie that focuses
on the effects of big business and the agro-industrial complex.
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- Audiences throw their popcorn aside, pick up their ballot
papers and realise that they too can make a difference. The studio behind
the movie: 20th Century Fox, owned by Rupert Murdoch. The director: Roland
Emmerich; no Martin Sheen-style bleeding heart Democrat but the brawn behind
Independence Day.
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- It sounds unlikely, but this summer might just see an
alliance of commerce, populist entertainment and feel-good concern combine
to weaken President George Bush and hand votes to his expected Democrat
rival John Kerry.
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- On the other hand, the film could tank, like one of its
director's other monster-budget summer openings, Godzilla.
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- May 28 sees the worldwide release of The Day After Tomorrow,
the eco-armageddon story to beat all others.
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- The first trailers for the film, released on the internet
last week, give a taste of the scale of the eco-horrors to come. Filmed
in a combination of slick computer generated special effects and faux newscast
verité, tidal waves sweep across cities and snow piles halfway up
the towers of Manhattan as disjointed voices articulate the chaos around
them.
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- "What you are seeing is happening now," says
a breathless newsreader. "Look over behind me," shouts a TV reporter,
"that's a tornado, yes, a twister." The film cuts to a volcano
erupting next to the Hollywood sign in Los Angeles. A huge flock of birds
flies across the sky, a mass of people is seen crossing the Rio Grande
between Mexico and the United States.
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- Filmed with a budget of more than $100m (£55.6m)
and special effects said to be the greatest thing since, well, since the
last big budget movie, the film has one other difference from other Hollywood
blockbusters: it has a conscience.
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- "At some point during the filming we looked around
at all the lights, generators and trucks and we realised the very process
of making this picture is contributing to the problem of global warming,"
the director and producers say in a statement on the film's official website.
"We couldn't avoid putting CO2 into the atmosphere during the shoot,
but we discovered we could do something to make up for it; we could make
the film carbonneutral." By planting trees they will take out the
CO2 the production put in.
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- The film's website includes a lengthy list of internet
links to organisations that have researched the effects of global warming.
During filming last year, Emmerich described the film as "a popcorn
movie that's actually a little subversive".
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- Whether this is the typical hype that surrounds a Hollywood
blockbuster or the heartfelt statement of a tortured artist does not really
matter. What seems certain is that the film will help to propel global
warming and the environment high up the political agenda.
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- President Bush is known to be sceptical about the possibility
of global warming, while the environment is a traditional strong card for
the Democrats. With issues such as oil drilling rights in Alaska playing
strongly among some voters, the president's opponents have regularly attacked
him for the favouritism he is perceived to have shown to the fossil fuel
giants that dominate the US economy.
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- Unrest
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- The Pentagon even got in on the act, releasing a study
last month that suggested that one outcome of global warming could be the
rise of mass civil unrest. In one scenario, drought, famine and rioting
erupt across the world, spurred on by climate change. As countries face
dwindling food supplies and scarce natural resources, conflict becomes
the norm.
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- "Disruption and conflict will be endemic features
of life," says the Pentagon study. "Once again, warfare would
define human life."
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- "The climate is going to play a significant role
in the campaign," said Luke Breit, chairman of the Democrat's environmental
caucus in California, where the environment is traditionally a key political
issue. "John Kerry is mentioning clean air and water at every opportunity.
It's going to be on the first tier of issues. Our job is to make clear
how anti-environment the government has been."
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- But while it can be fortuitous for an event such as a
mass appeal movie to come along and propel an issue to the forefront of
voters' consciousness, there are also pitfalls. "The danger is it
could make it look more trivial," said Mr Breit. "My guess is
that people in the environmental leadership around the country are holding
their breath. I'm hoping that it's going to be very good and that we have
great entertainment value but that at the same time it treats the science
seriously."
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- One US environmental pressure group has already enlisted
the help of one of the film's stars, Jake Gyllenhaal, to help promote its
agenda while promoting the film.
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- The Day After Tomorrow's advance publicity suggests a
typical Hollywood mix of fact, fantasy and hype: fake weather reports and
testimonies from fans about where they would like to be the day the world
dies are mixed with earnest exhortations to help avert global warming.
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- And Hollywood has been here before. The Perfect Storm,
Armageddon and Twister all combined Hollywood's love of little people battling
insurmountable natural - and unnatural - powers while giving great special
effects.
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- "In Independence Day Roland Emmerich brought you
the near destruction of the earth by aliens," says the website. "Now,
in The Day After Tomorrow, the enemy is an even more devastating force:
nature itself." It'll have them voting in the aisles.
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- Climate Change Differences May Play Role in
Swing States, Observers Say
By Darren Samuelsohn Greenwire
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- Thursday 11 March 2004
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- The sharp contrast between President Bush and his presumptive
Democratic challenger Sen. John Kerry (Mass.) over climate change policy
and regulation of carbon dioxide could significantly raise the stakes for
the candidates in key coal-producing states expected to swing the outcome
of the November election.
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- In interviews yesterday, political observers and participants
in the climate change debate offered varying perspectives on how Kerry's
commitment to tight federal controls on greenhouse gas emissions from coal-fired
power plants and other industries could affect voter preferences in swing
states like Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee and West Virginia.
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- Edward Krenik, an industry lobbyist and former director
of the EPA congressional affairs office under former Administrator Christie
Whitman, said he expected the Bush campaign to translate Kerry's support
for "four-pollutant" legislation into a blunt message that Kerry
would undercut economic recovery and simultaneously kill domestic jobs,
two critical issues in the election.
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- Kerry's climate change platform, which according to his
campaign Web site also includes a renewed U.S. commitment to international
negotiations and domestic caps on all greenhouse gas-producing industries,
will be a "tough sell" for coal-producing states, Krenik said.
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- The Bush administration's climate change position, perhaps
best reflected by his decision in 2001 to pull the United States out of
Kyoto Protocol negotiations, has allowed Kerry to chart an alternative
course as a presidential candidate.
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