An Inconvenient Truth

I went to see An Inconvenient Truth last night, its opening night in Portland. There were about eight different times for the movie, and all of them were sold out. (I had bought tickets a few weeks earlier.)

I thought it was very good. Like watching some kind of parallel universe, only there the joke isn't on you. Gore was informed and passionate and interesting and funny and very knowledgeable, everything Bush is not and never will be. It's interesting to speculate if Gore would be as loose and with-it if he had been elected sworn-in as president -- I mostly doubt it. He'd no doubt be too tossed around by the daily political seas and too much under constant attack by the VRWC. I still wish he were president, but in losing Gore may just have found the calling that he's most suited for.

I also did not see this movie as much of a campaign vehicle. If it were it would have been less wonky and more gauzy, less scientific and more marketing. If Gore were really testing the waters for 2008, the movie would be less understated politically. I take him at his word that he's not running.

This is absolutely a must-see movie for anyone even remotely interested in global warming, and a should-see even if you're just interested in the future. I learned plenty of things I hadn't known before or about which I only has hazy ideas -- most illuminating, I think, was the chart on the lousy CAFE standards in the US and how their projection into the future, even under California's optimistic scenario, is still far less than what the rest of the world is doing. I'm going to buy Gore's book just for that chart alone, and it should be shoved in front of the face of every auto executive who claims they can't produce more energy efficient cars.