Colloquium speakers find 'kernel of truth' in science-fiction movies

10/01/08 - In an evening with popcorn, entertainment and spotlights on the speakers, the Fall 2008 Honors Colloquium evaluated the truth behind movie excerpts pertaining to global climate change and other science fiction topics.University of Rhode Island Professors Kathryn Moran of oceanography and Tom Zorabedian of film studies and communications, showed clips, followed by a brief evaluation and commentary period.

While many of the films contained "a kernel of truth," many of them were exaggerated or dramatic. Phenomena resulting from climate change can be addressed from topics in the movies.

While the films portrayed real issues in a fictional or hyperbolized way, the threat of climate change is very much a fact, Moran said.

"At the rates we're exporting [carbon dioxide], I think, and many people would agree, we're seeing a major shift" of environmental patterns, Moran said.

Zorabedian provided cinematic history and filmography information, while Moran provided the environmental and science insight. Most of these revolved around "The Day After Tomorrow," a movie that shows the rapid formation of an ice age as a consequence of global warming.

Though the films gravitated toward climate change, not all films were about the environment. One clip was from a 1951 science fiction film, "The Day the Earth Stood Still," about an alien who came to the planet with a message of peace, which Zorabedian said was intended as a commentary on fears of Communism during the Cold War.

Zorabedian said films traditionally use fiction to deliver a warning and often involve traumatic situations. They also help educate audiences about science in a down-to-earth manner, he said.

"These kinds of films are crisis films that allow us to reveal the profile of science ... to the public," Moran said. "Not all of it is fact, but there are pieces that certainly are."

In "The Day After Tomorrow," polar ice caps melt and reduce the salinity of the ocean, which changes ocean currents that warm the planet.

Other environmental catastrophes brought in sub-freezing air from Earth's atmosphere and caused an ice age. The film also showed broadcast news reporters tracking the storms.

"For some reason that film captured the truth about weather people. They like to stand out in front of storms," Moran said to a laughing audience. Moran said Greenland ice melting could reduce the salinity of the ocean and change currents, but it would not be to the magnitude shown in the movie.

Also in the movie, Los Angeles was torn apart by a super cell, a massive storm system that could involve several tornadoes and hail.

Super cells do exist, Moran said, but they're not as violent as the movie showed them. In the movie, Manhattan was also ravaged by an ocean swell, which she said couldn't happen that quickly.

The most violent of tidal swells, Moran said, are about 10 feet, and in the movie the waves were about five stories high. Even the tsunami in the Indian Ocean in 2005, which killed more than 200,000 people, was about 90 feet high, according to Moran.

The best thing, Moran said, was that "The Day After Tomorrow" attracted media attention in the real world to the overall issue of global climate change and put climatologists in the spotlight.

"I'm not a climatologist, but I study a little piece of it," Moran said while explaining the role of greenhouse gasses, such as carbon dioxide, water vapor and methane, in global warming.

A movie called "Soylent Green," which takes place in New York City in 2022, shows food in the form of small, cracker-sized squares of different colors with different nutrients. New York had a population of 40 million in the movie, and there were food shortages and dump trucks called "scoops" that would lift up and isolate unruly crowd members during food shortage riots.

A character watched cinematic clips of flowers, forests and waterfalls, which didn't exist in the New York of the movie. The clip finished with the main character claiming that Soylent Green, the most nutritious of the Soylent cubes, was made of human bodies.

And while meat is not made of human bodies, Moran did point out that modern agricultural trends have contributed to disease.

"In our culture today, we've moved to feeding meat to animals, which we then turn and eat," Moran said. This practice led to Mad Cow Disease, she explained after the evening finished.

Moran said beetles are affecting forests in Canada, and the droughts portrayed in the film are already happening in some parts of the world.

"Australia is so extreme, people are committing suicide because of the loss of livelihood," Moran said. And there are other historical truths from "Soylent Green," Moran said, such as an Irish potato famine in the 19th century, which caused a wave of immigration.

Derek Brockmann, a URI student in the Honors Colloquium class, said the movies and popcorn provided a different atmosphere for the audience.

"It's a change of pace because it's been highly academic," Brockmann said. "And film is one of those things that change peoples' views." He added that the films help "define the boundary" between fact and fiction.