Age of Stupid

Age of Stupid: verdict from 2055, delivered by Pete Postlethwaite.

Director Franny Armstrong, famous for McLibel, has stepped up her production values with this hard-hitting and highly original take on the little problem we have with climate change. Pete Postlethwaite – cast as the film’s central narrator, a man living alone in a devastated world in 2055 – carries the theme with gravitas. Yet, despite its subject matter the film manages to be witty, intelligent and richly human. Issues such as the militarization of the rich world’s oil addiction are brought alive by weaving together the film’s narrative and documentary footage from present-day Iraq, India, New Orleans, Jordan, Nigeria and Britain.

Age of Stupid’s parting shot is the provocation ‘are we worth saving?’ If our profit-driven, consumerist culture has nurtured our worst tendencies, then the historic moment we now face provides a unique opportunity for building a new world on a set of more enlightened values to encourage the best in us.

PE

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