More than 70 percent of people in the world are visual learners, yet the overwhelming majority of studies and news on climate change comes in text form. Scientists and activists can use fictitious representations of the Earth in order to simulate the future and to help increase awareness of the issue around the globe. In addition, everyone loves to watch a good movie, and thus by inserting messages about global conservation and the urgency to change behavior within a plot, a director can try and educate a larger portion of the population.
Unfortunately, directors often overestimate the size of the problem in order to make a movie more enticing. An example of this are the recent movie Interstellar. The overall plot of the film is that climate change on Earth is causing the death of crops, due to a dry climate shown below:
This dry climate will make the Earth inhabitable in just a matter of years and thus a few scientists are sent on a mission in order to find a new home planet. The problem with a plot akin to that of Interstellar is that it promotes a hopeless view of global warming. The message that the world is doomed and a future on Earth is impossible does not promote activism. Rather viewers feel that climate change is a challenge that cannot be corrected, and thus behavior will not change.
If movies portrayed a sustainable environment rather than this negative view, people would get hope and could react to the climate change. One example, would be a fictional movie similar to The Imitation Game, which is about Alan Turing cracking the enigma code during World War II. In our movie, scientists find a solution or a vision to build a sustainable environment and we simulate the transformation and potential government legislation and behavioral changes needed by the public. This movie would give citizens hope that we can become sustainable tomorrow, while educating them on ways they can change their behavior today
