j* movie reviews 2020

Wilder Than Wild (2018)

Wilder Than Wild (2018) BOFA 58mins

Gen X loves to watch the world burn, but this film talks about the need to keep forest fires at a safe scale so we don't char the popcorn.

This film is a really tidy exploration of the Californian wildfire phenomenon. It brings together a range of players and positions the current situation with the historical contexts. I found myself developing an understanding of how the conflicting parties had been intersecting for hundreds of years. It touches on the tradition owners relationships with burning, including tribal kids given boxes of matches and told to "go up there and burn that hill," the economical forestry with a military firefighting complex determined to extinguish at all costs, and the National Parks, operating at some kind of intermediate setting. The even find space to give some air time to Smokey Bear - the most successful extinguishing fire campaign ever.

We hear from the firefighters who've been faced with what are becoming unfightable fires, see their memorial walkways and up-close footage. We travel with the National Parks service as they light and tend to low intensity fires - the only way to clear out the fuel loads. And as the exploration progresses we see large, multidisciplinary groups coming together to share their knowledge and skills in the management of fire prone spaces.

There's also a range of exploration of the knock on effects of changing climate, both in terms of the impact on the forests and fuel loads, and in terms of the impact of massive fires releasing huge carbon dioxide loads.

It feels like it covers a huge amount of information in just an hour - well worth a watch in terms of a large fire management perspective.

J* gives it 4 stars.