March 24th, 2008
7. Independence Day
As if it weren't enough when a hostile, indestructible alien force invaded Earth, writers Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich made the space invaders environmentally wasteful. Via human-alien mind-meld—naturally—Bill Pullman learns that the alien force takes over planets, uses up the natural resources, then moves on. Playing yet another neurotic scientist, Jeff Goldblum trashes a room in despair: "We gotta burn the rainforest, pops," he tells his father, Judd Hirsch. "Dump toxic waste, pollute the air, rip up the ozone. Maybe if we screw this planet up enough, they won't want it any more!"
8. Michael Jackson, "Earth Song"
As last week's Inventory on misguided charity songs attests, Michael Jackson is pretty much the poster boy for good intentions gone horribly awry. Yet even by Jackson's exceedingly lenient standards, his 1995 message song "Earth Song" is a grotesquely overblown, maudlin ballad hectoring listeners into hearing the plaintive howls of "this crying earth, this weeping shore." The video is even more of a heavy-handed downer: It's a solemn parade of human misery and ecological disasters, intercut with Jackson wandering soulfully through a post-apocalyptic hellscape in a series of vaguely messianic poses. It's as subtle, nuanced, and even-handed as a "God Hates Fags" protest.
9. On Deadly Ground
When Steven Seagal negotiated his participation in a sequel to his hit Under Siege, his main demand was that he be allowed to make his directorial debut with this masterpiece of PC action corn. Seagal plays oil-fire-fighter Forrest Taft (you know he loves the environment, because his name is Forrest!), who discovers malfeasance on the part of his employer and decides, ultimately, that the best way to protect the environment is to blow up a refinery. But first he has to demonstrate his kinship with Native Americans, first by stopping some rednecks from beating one up ("What does it take to change the essence of a man?" he asks the shame-faced rednecks), and then by embarking on a vision quest that has him running naked across the tundra with a bear. In spite of the film's box-office failure, Seagal wasn't done playing a friend to the land; three years later, he stepped into the role of a rogue EPA agent in the equally ludicrous Fire Down Below. If nothing else, the environmental movement has blessed us with two classics of the bad-movie genre… though don't expect that fact to show up on any Greenpeace mailings.
10. Prophecy
Working from a script by The Omen scribe David Seltzer, John Frankenheimer brings way more filmmaking skill than required to this tale of a lumber mill's dire impact on the ecology of woodsy Maine. How dire? Dire enough to produce repulsive mutant babies who grow up to be stuntmen in slightly modified, slimy bear costumes. Can noble/angry Native American Armand Assante convince everyone that the Earth does not belong to us, we belong to the Earth, before it's too late? Maybe. But first, some campers bite the dust.
11. Saved By The Bell
Similar to Paul Thomas Anderson's epic capitalist fable There Will Be Blood, only dumber and cuter, the '90s teen sitcom Saved By The Bell explored how wanton greed and blatant disregard for the harmful side effects of oil prospecting can wreck the souls of men, as well as blond boys who talk to the camera. Saved By The Bell's oil episode begins, in the series' usual inexplicable fashion, with irrepressible preppie Zack Morris making friends with a duck named Becky he has accidentally hit with a baseball behind the high school. Just as Daniel Plainview's son H.W. comes to represent all the inner good the father eventually betrays, Becky is a metaphor for Zack's kinder, gentler side, which is soon poisoned by dreams of vast wealth after Slater discovers oil in the football field. In spite of the efforts of the muckraking Jessie Spano, whose Upton Sinclair-esque newsletter No Oil In Bayside is ignored by the 10-person student body, oil companies come in to drill the field. Tragically, there's a spill, and Becky is killed. Zack Morris—and the audience—learn a sad, valuable lesson: If you discover oil in the football field behind your high school, keep it a secret. Otherwise, your beloved duck friend will die. Unfortunately, this environmental lesson is applicable only in a world controlled by hacky sitcom writers.
12. Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home
The final shot of Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home should've been the rear of the Starship Enterprise sporting a giant "Save The Whales" bumper sticker, though by the end of the film, audiences probably got the message clearly enough. The fourth feature-length installment of the series, released in 1986, essentially answers the question "Why should I save the whales? What good does it do me, the average earthling?" Answer: If humpback whales are extinct in the 23rd century, their song won't be able to placate the mysterious alien force that will evaporate Earth's oceans and end human life on the planet. (It seems so obvious…) Also: Whales are beautiful creatures, and female scientists who study whales are hot enough for Kirk to space-bone. But that's just a space bonus.
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