Planet Earth is suffering. From deforestation in Africa and strip mining in Appalachia, to those simply too lazy to recycle empty soda bottles, businesses and individuals are constantly wasting precious natural resources and polluting the air with carbon dioxide and other emissions. Fortunately, there are people trying to do something about it.

Narrated by Tilda Swinton, reading poetry written by Simon Armitage, the documentary Climate of Changespans four continents following people not only trying to reduce their own effect on our climate, but lead movements to stop the destruction that is going on around them. With the central theme of education and personal effort, there is a great amount of hope that the tide can be turned. The message just needs to be delivered.

The scope of this film is simply spectacular, and it’s hard to imagine that it took less than a few years to create (in actuality, filming lasted only nine months, from January to September 2008). Directed by acclaimed documentarian Brian Hill, many of the shots are simply breathtaking, watching celebrations in Togo full of dancing and singing or just walking from the streets of Mumbai, India. The film is about the need to preserve the world that we take advantage of everyday, and how could you want to see the destruction of something so beautiful?

Interspersing the stories, no two areas have the same message, keeping the audience fully aware at all times of not only what is happening all around the world, but also what can be done to stop it. Some of the people are fighting for personal property, such as a man living in Appalachia who refuses to sell his family’s land of seven generations to strip mining companies who want to destroy it, while others work to spread the green message, like a woman working for an environmental public relations company that teaches businesses how to reduce their impact. Though the film follows eight different stories in total, at no point is any narrative thread lost nor does the documentary feel like it is making the audience juggle.

Swinton’s calm voice and Armitage’s words are simply bow on the packaging of this film. Rather than being used to introduce us to interview subjects or even present statistics, the narration adds beauty to the already incredible landscapes. One poem in particular, written about an underground seed storage facility in Svalbard, Norway, is haunting as we move from snowy streets to tomb below, known to some as the Doomsday Vault, where 4.5 million duplicates of seeds are stored. (Having a copy of the poem in front of me, I am resisting every urge to reprint the entire thing).

In many ways, the film is a sequel in spirit to the 2006 Al Gore documentary An Inconvenient Truth. Where that first film had the former Vice President giving a lecture and presenting statistics, this film presents people responding to that message and doing something about it. I would be remiss if I didn’t conclude my review with a link to the film’s website (http://www.takepart.com/climateofchange). This documentary is a call to action: don’t just wait for government reform, take personal responsibility and change will come.

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