These are the questions that in 2021 inspired my dissertation when studying my MSc in Ecology and Sustainability, at the Centre for Alternative Technology. Having previously worked as a production coordinator on series for National Geographic, I often asked myself “what impact will my work have”. After watching the recent rise of the ‘green-chip’ programmes¹ , with their big-budget and dramatically spectacular stories about the climate and ecological crises, and having seen how my production team and the general public reacted to these stories, I was curious to find out more about how Natural History documentaries can inspire change.

After carrying out a thorough review of academic literature, with the support of my extremely kind network of old colleagues, I interviewed 20 filmmakers, attended numerous events and watched hours of content. Now I can safely say I didn’t answer these questions, but here are some of the key take-aways from my research:

“If climate isn’t in your story, it’s science fiction.”²

Knowledge of the climate crisis is interwoven into our cultural consciousness. Even if we don’t know all the facts, we still know it’s real. If our stories don’t openly acknowledge it, they run the risk of minimising the audience’s sense of urgency and the need to act, which erases the people and ecosystems that are struggling today. This risks delaying change³.

Spectacular apocalypse, boring doom and gloom and emotional flow.

Audiences want to hear climate and environmental stories⁴! But as we are all bombarded by doom and gloom in the daily news, we risk becoming desensitised or depressed and end up seeking entertaining distractions. We do need to see some of the threat, to feel anger and a sense of urgency. However, what happens when you use blue-chip’s big-budget, glossy and awe-inspiring techniques⁵ to frame the environmental crisis? What happens when you spectacularise the apocalypse?

By making the emergency entertaining it becomes a little like a Hollywood film. Though unlike Hollywood, when we turn the TV off, the emergency doesn’t go away. Yes, you need emotional engagement, but don’t end the story with apocalypse as it risks the audience disengaging with the crises and leaving the programming feeling apathy or despair. As any good storytellers would, consider what comes next. By creating an emotional flow from fear into hope, you leave audiences feeling positive and wanting to engage with the urgent need to change now⁶.

Framing the next step: Sexy solutions and personal stories.

“Sexy solutions” such as the expert’s big tech fix all, greenwashing with tempting tiny action, or even the “phew” they are doing that so I don’t have to… All these enticing and entertaining stories could distract us from longer term engagement with problems that aren’t going away. Instead, find stories of real people and communities who make mistakes, learn and make change⁷. And for longer term change, audiences need resources to come back to after finishing the episode, there needs to be a next step. Solutions don’t need to be spectacular. They need to be many, they need to be woven together and they need to be shared. It is the first step that inspires the next⁸.

Climate anxiety. Grief. And hope…

Anger, grief, apathy, hope, fear… These are emotions I feel, audiences feel and a lot of filmmakers I interviewed felt too. Learning of the loss of a species or witnessing environmental damage when you are filming is devastating. The feelings of frustration were clear, but so too was the lack of places to talk about them, as interviewees explained that company and production meetings often glossed over these issues. Climate anxiety is a healthy normal response to the scale and complexity of this global emergency⁹. If you can, build places and communities to talk about them with others. Feel your feelings, don’t end up stuck in apathy. Your feelings as the storyteller are a powerful part of your story.

Isolating the individual: I am too small to make change.

Who else tells themselves this almost every day? Or pushes responsibility onto someone else with more control and influence? I do. ‘Shifting the blame’ has helped me direct my anger at others rather than using it to fuel my own sense of personal agency. This narrative is common in media, politics and in everyday life. It individualises responsibility rather than encouraging a sense of the collective and collaborative action¹⁰ I have always loved the dynamics of a film crew who came together and worked to their strengths to tell a story. The same must be done here, otherwise we end up living by a story that makes us feel isolated and confused and helps to delays change¹¹.

Since finishing my MSc, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about these questions. Now I sit here at University of the West of England Bristol, having just started a PhD as I want to further explore how wildlife documentaries could communicate the issues of climate and ecological justice. I’m really excited to work with filmmakers again, to hear their ideas and feelings, but I hope to work with a much wider variety of people in the broadcasting industry and work with audiences too.

If you are interested in getting involved or what to know more, I invite you to get in touch through the contact page! I would love to have a chat.

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1. “Green-chip” is a term from Morgan Richard’s 2013 chapter: Greening wildlife documentary, from the book ‘Environmental conflict and the media’. https://www.peterlang.com/document/1051222
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2. Dorothy Fortenberry, Writer and Producer of The Handmaid’s Tale:  https://www.goodenergystories.com/playbook
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3. For more information about ‘delay discourses’ here is a good infographic: https://www.leolinne.com/-discourses-of-climate-delay/english
   
   Or here is the original article: https://www-cambridge-org.ezproxy.uwe.ac.uk/core/journals/global-sustainability/article/discourses-of-climate-delay/7B11B722E3E3454BB6212378E32985A7?utm_campaign=shareaholic&utm_medium=copy_link&utm_source=bookmark
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4. albert’s ‘The Climate Content Briefing’ highlights that audiences are increasingly interested in climate change content: https://wearealbert.org/the-climate-content-pledge/
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5. “Blue-chip” is a broadcasting term used to describe the bigger and more expensive wildlife series. You can read more about the term here: https://www.docfilmacademy.com/blog/how-to-become-a-wildlife-filmmaker#:~:text=What%20is%20a%20Blue%20Chip%20Documentary%3F ↩︎
6. Read more about “Alchemizing Sorrow Into Deep Determination”: Emotional Reflexivity and Climate Change’ here: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fclim.2022.786631/full
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7. Find out more about how ‘Personal Climate Stories Can Persuade’ from the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication: https://climatecommunication.yale.edu/publications/personal-climate-stories-can-persuade/
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8. Here is the behaviour change research that supports a positive spillover effect ‘Transforming the stories we tell about climate change: from ‘issue’ to ‘action’: https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/abcd5a/meta ↩︎
9. To find out more here is a podcast from the Climate Psychology Alliance with Clover Hogan: https://open.spotify.com/episode/0RPW4OIybpYIpNrshDr5UB?si=fde100a6e58d443d
   
   With another on the idea of ‘eco-empathy’: https://open.spotify.com/episode/7hoVCzO9mu8s9D8yOrhIin?si=35b446360fb94622
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10. Why we need ‘Collective responsibility for climate change’: https://wires.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/wcc.830
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11. Here is a useful guide that breaks down common stories we tell about climate change, ‘Warm Words: How are we telling the climate story and can we tell it better?’: https://www.jstor.org/stable/resrep15716
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