With all the national debate over healthcare in the United States these days it’s easy to forget the other national debate that will begin once the furor over healthcare legislation dies down, and that is the environment with cap-and-trade. Hollywood is fond of environmental apocalypse films these days, and while the reader is no doubt familiar with Wall*E and Avatar, you may not have heard of Battle for Terra. Joshua Bellin, author of Framing Monters, and a past guest here for two previous interviews, one on his book and the other contrasting the how the issue of race is treated in the original King Kong and in Peter Jackson’s remake, recently had an article posted online that addresses Battle for Terra and other films that touch on environmental apocalyptic. As he describes it

Terra tells the story of a winsome race of aliens whose planet is invaded by the last human survivors of an Earth our species has laid waste. In a particularly insidious form of colonization, the earthlings plan to oxygenate the aliens’ atmosphere–certain death for the Terrans. But thanks to one human dissenter’s friendship with a waiflike Terran revolutionary, the evil scheme is averted, its masterminds slain, and a permanent human colony erected on Terra to house the dissenting pilot’s peace-minded disciples.

In his article Bellin goes on to consider how well these films respond to our environmental challenges, and his verdict is not positive. For example, in discussing Avatar he writes that its

fundamental hypocrisy eclipses any putative environmentalist leanings: not only does Cameron’s film erase the historical fact that whites didn’t start to hanker for the Indians’ love of the land until they’d stolen and raped virtually all the land the Indians loved, but it reinforces the New Age belief that redemption from such historical sins can be earned through further consumption, the stockpiling of more commodified, otherworldly junk (faux dream catchers and sweat lodge ceremonies, Avatars on hi-def and Blu-ray). Rather than calling for true reform here at home, which might actually cost something, Avatar turns once more outward, seeking salvation from another alien culture whose wisdom and whose world can be snapped up for a song.

No doubt fantastic films will continue to find inspiration in environmental challenges, but the question remains as to how well they will incorporate realistic responses for our times.