The 19th Annual Environmental Film Festival Explorer: Climbing Redwood Giants

Photo Credit: http://www.dcenvironmentalfilmfest.org/films/show/599

WASHINGTON, DC – I visited the 19th Annual Environmental Film Festival in the nation’s capitol on its kick-off day-- Tuesday, March 15, 2011. The festival was launched on cinema screens across Washington, DC through Sunday, March 27, 2011.

According to the program booklet, “the festival consisted of 150 documentary, narrative, animated, archival, experimental, and children’s films from 40 countries by 52 filmmakers…that [promised] to deepen our understanding of the relationship between our planet, its resources and ourselves..Most screenings included discussions and were free…Special pre-festival events took place on March 9 and 10, 2011.”

After reading chapter four of our text on ecosystems, I visited the National Geographic Society’s 12:00 noon film festival screening of Explorer: Climbing Redwood Giants, at 1600-M Street, NW, Washington, DC. The screening was held in the Gilbert H. Grosvenor Auditorium, located on the first floor. The auditorium looks like a movie theater. I visited two separate photo galleries in the foyer- immediately outside the entrance of the auditorium, and I signed the guest registry upon entry.

Photo gallery in the National Geographic foyer and the entrance of the Gilbert H. Grosvenor Auditorium         

The film was introduced by Rock Wheeler, Editorial Manager of National Geographic Live. I had the opportunity to meet Mr. Wheeler before and after the screening (although I did not realize who he was when I first met him).

Rock Wheeler speaking with other visitors after the screening

“Explorer: Climbing the Redwood Giants,” was produced by John Rubin Productions for National Geographic Television. John Ruben wrote, produced and co-directed the film with James Donald. The film has won many awards including the following:

International Forest Film Festival, Forest Hero Award; Wild & Scenic Film Festival, Most Inspiring Adventure Film; 31st Annual News & Documentary Emmy Award Nominations for Outstanding Nature Programming and Outstanding Nature Cinematography; 33nd Annual International Wildlife Film Festival (Missoula) Finalist in Ecosystem and Television Program; and 2010 New York Festivals International Television & Film Awards, Gold World Medal Nature and Wildlife. (http://www.johnrubin.com/won.html).

Photo Credit: The Environmental Film Festival

Unfortunately, most of my photos did not develop well. Most are too dark. Although the film’s cinematography is magnificent, the film’s narrator, Peter Coyote, apologizes in the film’s opening that none of the images in the film can truly capture the majestic nature of the giant redwoods. See for yourself in an excerpt of the film posted to YouTube.com by National Geographic. Watch forest ecologist, Steve Sillett, study the crowns
of the redwood canopies: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9WMxqrRkFRU


“In 1996, Steve Sillett was the first scientist to ascend into the redwood canopy,” the narrator tells us.

However, one of National Geographic’s YouTube excerpts of the film does not focus on the majestic beauty of the redwood forest, but on the ugly response to civil unrest that took place in California during the1990’s to save the first-generation redwood trees: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWBuzhPykyE. The National Geographic Society’s giant screen almost made me feel as though I was there.

Another excerpt of the film and its ecological lessons has since been posted by the United Nations: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-8OCecOmEQ.

The film’s overall message is that we are ultimately responsible for harvestry of the redwoods- the world’s tallest living things; hence, we are responsible for saving them.

Although not included in any of the YouTube excerpts, the narrator of the film makes the following statement regarding the historic significance of the redwood giants worth noting:

In the1800s, the colossal trees seemed to provide an endless supply of wood until overharvested… Almost all the ancient trees have been cut down…The redwoods and their close relatives- the giant sequoias- dominated the northern hemisphere during the dinosaur age..The California redwoods survived the Ice Age and are one of the fastest growing organisms on earth...showering the forest with millions of seeds…Redwoods may be alive today that were seedlings when Jesus was born… Most redwoods don’t topple from natural causes…About 90 to 95 percent of the ancients have been cut down, and now scientists are studying what’s left…Most logging now takes place in 2nd growth forest (Explorer: Climbing Redwood Giants).

The narrator refers to the redwoods as Titans up to 30 feet in the air (30 stories high), with the lowest branches about 200 feet off the ground.

The film also documents the year-long journey of two explorers- Ms. Holmes, Conservationist and Activist and Mike Fey, Explorer for the National Geographic Wildlife Conservation Society, as they study the Redwood Forest from end-to-end (south to north), 450 miles in a straight line. They made every effort to identify the most southern redwood, which wound up standing 20 feet from the highway. This is where their journey began. It was a difficult terrain to walk.

It took scientists eight years to measure and chart everything- from the forest floor to the canopy—five to six times anything ever documented in the rainforest.

The “mother-tree” is the most complicated of the redwood eco-system, has the most number of branches, and stands 300 feet tall, 100 feet wide, with a 100 feet canopy!

The redwoods have survived extreme, cold rainy winters and hot/dry summers with no summer rain fall. The secret to how the redwoods acquire water is fog; the redwood canopies absorb moisture from fog like root systems in the sky. About a quarter to half of the redwoods’ water come from fog. The advantage of fog water is that such tall trees do not have to lift water from tree roots in the ground to the top; they absorb fog water directly into the leaves of their canopies. Maximum tree height can reach 450 feet! In 2006, scientists discovered a 3719.1 foot redwood- the tallest living thing on the planet, and the record has not been broken yet.

The narrator of the film mentions that Mystery Theme Park maintains acres of old growth trees. Mystery Theme Park is located in the center of the Redwood National and State Parks in California: http://www.treesofmystery.net/ Mystery Theme Park’s website describes the redwood trees as “taller than the Statue of Liberty, from base of the pedestal to the tip of the torch and ... larger around and through than a Greyhound bus, and shares that a typical Redwood forest contains more biomass per square foot than ANY other area on earth, and that includes the Amazonian rain forests.”

I am glad I chose the National Geographic Society’s presentation of The 19th Annual
Environmental Film Festival’s Explorer: Climbing Redwood Giants for my third extra-credit assignment. I had heard so much about the giant redwoods, but I have never visited them; nor, had I ever seen such close footage of them. I was also pleased to discover that the National Geographic Society’s library is open to the public!