Erde

Extraordinary, awe-inspiring shots of tremendous civil engineering projects, interspersed with simple yet intriguing interviews. In the first six segments (out of seven), the director takes the courageous and unusual decision to let the project workers speak about themselves and their projects. They are all knowledgeable, proud of their accomplishments and of their usefulness to society, but also, to various degrees, conscious of the awesome impact of their work on the natural environment, and thereby somewhat conflicted. I found this all really compelling. Sadly however, in the last segment the film reverts to trite "they are hurting Mother Earth" messaging from protester types, and that is much more familiar and therefore less interesting.