Directors of The 11th Hour speak out

In order to get to a place of true inspiration and true hope, you have to know what the reality is that you're dealing with. And that was the intention of The 11th Hour. Taking the blinders off and seeing things as they are. – co-director, Nadia Conners

The Global Intelligencer interviews co-directors Nadia Conners (right) & Leila Conners Petersen (left)

How did Tree Media Group get in touch with Leonardo on this project?

NADIA – Tree Media has been around for 10 years, so we've been doing a lot of progressive and online and film stuff, and we did a short film with Ray Harrelson. Leonardo saw it, liked it, and through that we were put together five years ago. We started off with a short film called Global Warming - which people were not talking about in this country at the time. Through our collaboration on that and another film short called On Water Scarcity, we had always been talking about doing a feature film. And so we jumped in and did it together. So it was completely formed through conversations with him, Leila, and myself. We did our first interview starting October 2005.

Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth which focused, of course, on global warming and I understand The 11th hour focuses on the broader issues of the state of the global environment. But I would think a lot of people might have a tendency to lump it altogether and figure it’s the same stuff. How is The 11th Hour different in content and approach?

LEILA - The 11th Hour deals with the state of humanity and how we got to where we got in terms of destroying all the ecosystems. Climate change is a symptom of a deeper problem: how humans are thinking, and how we reacted to the discovery of oil, and created an industrial civilization - which are wonderful things. But they're also quite destructive. So we have to learn to take what we can from industrial civilization and then refashion a new world based on renewable energies and sources of energy that are not as destructive as oil. And that's what the film’s about. It's about more human things. The film spends seven minutes on climate change, you know. And that's how it's different.

We definitely talk about how solutions are present and that it is just a matter of leadership. And that's the question… if this is our only home why don't we take action considering there's nowhere else we can go if we mess it up here?

NADIA - As Leila said, it's how we've structured ourselves as a civilization. But I think that's key because most people are very disconnected from nature, and it's not anyone's fault. Like, we're sitting in an office right now. We are surrounded by things and the products of human society. And we often think of nature as an ‘away’ thing. But if you start discussing economy and psychology and consumption and all of those things, those are the things people understand; those are in their daily life. And so we’re trying to make links to connect people back to what's happening.

Leila you talked about addressing some of the more human things in this film. Could you give some examples of what you were talking about?

LEILA - We talk about the human proclivity to acquire things, consumption. The idea that we define ourselves by what we buy. And that's OK up to a point. But there's an ethical dimension to consumption eventually, where you have to address “how much is too much?” And we're not, obviously, going to say “this is exactly how much it should be.” It's a conversation that people start needing to have about what is too much? What's enough and what makes you happy as a person? And maybe a lot of stuff equals happiness for you, and if that's the way it is, OK. But you need to know what you're doing is impoverishing future generations. We're giving future generations a biotically impoverished world. We need to understand that.

So, from a solutions point of view… you know Albert Einstein once said “you can't solve the problems we've created with the same mind that created the problems to begin with.”

NADIA - That's so funny. I said that in an interview recently.

Exactly. So far social and political philosophy in the last 200 years has been about competition, unlimited growth, and scarcity economics. These are the basis of our problems today. So having completed The 11th Hour, within the context of the current US administration’s policies regarding the environment, what do we do? What do human beings do?

NADIA - I think your point is exactly the point of our film. Subtly and ultimately where we're going with the film is trying to encourage a consciousness shift so that you don't ever look at the world the same way again. And maybe the first thing isn't about running and changing your light bulbs - although these small actions are very important and I don't want it discount them. But, I think with the film we're taking a step back and thinking, “maybe the primary thing that has to happen is your consciousness shifts”; the way you look at the world. And after you see the movie you may - and we’ve seen a tremendous response from viewers - that they have subtly but fundamentally begun to look at the world in a different way. And I think that is the beginning of a really profound solution.

Because if you just know that there is global warming and there are 10 things you're supposed to do, like fill up your tires, buy a Prius, change your light bulbs… that helps, but it doesn't take it to the scale that we need to take it too, which is creating a new consciousness that can solve the problems created by the old consciousness. So it is a spiritual message at the end of the day.

LEILA - And the thing is, people think we can't change. There is this incredible resistance like you're asking Americans to stop consuming. Well no, we're not. We're just asking to have a dialogue about “how much is enough?” The reality is, we used to be different. We've changed. So we can continue to change. There's a lot of entrenched forces that want to keep us where we are right now.

How did you select your interviewees for the movie?

LEILA - We knew a lot of people in the film. We also worked with Kenny Alaizabel from the Bioneers, and David Orr, and they helped us identify the people we didn't know. A lot of people were familiar to us because they've been on the frontlines for the last 30 years talking about this stuff. Some people were well known and some people weren't. And we just wanted to have a comprehensive representation of the thought that was out there.

Of those interviewed, who do you feel were the most effective visionaries involved in finding practical solutions?

LEILA - They were all great. They're all really specific to their own expertise. And honestly they all were wonderful. We had 150 hours of interview footage that we had to cut down to 91 minutes and it was very difficult for that very reason.

NADIA - I would say they were all very interesting in their areas. Paul Hawken (author Blessed Unrest, The Ecology of Commerce) really inspired me because of his discussion of the movement. I really didn't know how broad this movement was. And that was incredibly inspirational for me as far as solutions were concerned. But the groundwork, the network, is really in place.

That was a really interesting theme that came up multiple times. That this is probably the largest movement in the history of human beings and it's underway right now. And it's a movement to basically restore this planet. And in that is social justice, poverty issues, and all these things that were once separated are now connected. Everything is being seen as part of a whole.

If you were a person sitting in the audience watching The 11th Hour and there was one idea, one solution that riveted you personally, what would that be?

NADIA - It's very hard, because that question is actually counter to the general message of our film. We try to stay away from single ideas because it seems to limit people's imaginations. But I’ll answer you. One of those things that struck me was the tree: what if you could design a building like a tree? And what if you could design a city like a forest? And really, what a tree does, and how amazing a tree is … this came from Bill McDonough and Andy Lipkis and other people all touched on it. We kept coming back to the tree and what a perfect design it was. And the thought if we could start designing in that way… that just lifted my heart, because it made things seem completely possible.

LEILA - I agree with what Nadia says, that we are trying to get away from the singular idea. Yes, a lot of things inspired me, but the point of this is that it's complex and multi-layered. And in our culture we like to try and highlight certain things and all of that. I understand why it happens. But it has not served us. It is not helped us to understand what's happening in the world. And we need to understand that it is complex, there are a lot of forces at play, and there are a lot of good things at play. And that's what's so exciting. It's multi-layered, you know? It's a cross-section between an awareness of what has to happen within human consciousness, what has to emerge, and the awareness that everything is connected and that we’re all a part of the web of life; and if part of the web of life is dying, it means we are all at risk.

That, coupled with the idea that nature has a lot of the solutions already figured out, we just have to look to nature for the answers. So this awareness will flood through our species, we hope. And we will then look to nature for help which we so desperately need.

That certainly is a shift from our current fundamental arrogant philosophy that man is above nature and that we will subdue her and wrest her secrets from her

LEILA – Yes. Everyone quotes this but you know it’s true, “nature bats last, and it's her playing field.” We can pretend for as long as we want that we run the show, but we don't. And we have to learn how to live here. Janine Benyus, author of Biomimicry, has a great quote that didn't make it in the film. And she says, you know, "A B-1 bomber is nature. Anything on the planet is nature because it came from here. The question is, is it well adapted? Anything that is not well adapted to nature's rules will go away. The only things that will remain are well adapted things to this biosphere.” And that's the whole point of the film - humans are not well adapted to this biosphere right now. And so we will go away if we don't change the way we do business. It's a basic message.

A lot of people go “Oh gosh, that's terrifying.” Well that's not how we set it up. Yes, it's terrifying. But that's what's happening. So the sooner we all get to that realization the better, because we actually have solutions that we can adopt immediately that will prevent the worst case scenarios from happening.

On your web site you comment that effective storytelling comes from a place of inspiration and not of fear. How have you managed to emphasize the storytelling of inspiration in The 11th Hour rather than the fear?

NADIA - I think there's a certain level of fear because this is the truth. This is what's happening and people aren't looking at it. But in order to get to a place of true inspiration and true hope, you have to know what the reality is that you're dealing with. And that was the intention of The 11th Hour. Taking the blinders off and seeing things as they are. We've been shielded from this reality by the media for a very long time. So that was the intention there.