Petropolis: Aerial Perspectives on the Alberta Tar Sands pretty much does what it says on the tin. The film is 45 minutes long and gives us an aerial perspective on how large the Tar Sands Oil project really is. It’s directed by Peter Mettler and follows on nicely to the film, Dirty Oil made by Leslie Iwerks that I reviewed here.
This is a hard one to review. There is no narration until the final 7 minutes of the movie but until that point, there is no dialogue and no real interaction supplied for the audience to engage in at all. In an attempt to bring a different perspective to the documentaries that we’ve come to know and love, Petropolis use visual imagery and a soothing soundtrack to let the pictures do the talking.
Hundreds, if not thousands of giant lorries, smoking chimneys, open pits, factories, can be seen in this footage which opens giving us details of how much pollution is emitted on a daily basis by the Tar Sands Oil companies. According to the on-screen text, enough gas is used in the factories to heat 4 million homes on a daily basis which is just astounding.
You can think of Petropolis as Planet Earth except in this instance, the animals are replaced with factories and oil. All the footage is shot in high definition and look awesome, but the fact of the matter is that although the imagery might look spectacular, the effects of what’s going on at Tar Sands could have an impact on our world’s climate that we’ll never be able to rectify.
You can find out more about Petropolis: Aerial Perspectives on the Alberta Tar Sands on the official website here
