Planet of the Humans

The film is incredibly informative. It does a really great job of showing how electric cars and solar panels still negatively impact the environment, despite what corporate marketing jargon will try and fraudulently claim. However, it fails to provide answers outside of flat out stating that “humanity is dying, and the only solution is for our species just to commit suicide. DON’T HAVE CHILDREN!” There has to be more to this, and if there’s not, well then, Planet of the Humans needs to do a better job at providing some dark humor to lighten the inevitable collapse of our species just a bit.    

I’m a big fan of Michael Moore’s films. You can agree or disagree with his politics, but the man knows how to make an entertaining documentary that’s perfectly seasoned with hilarity, heartwarming moments, intrigue, dissonance, and poignance. His films never make you walk away feeling bleak and powerless, so it’s a little frustrating to see his name attached to a movie that does so. That’s the whole reason I wanted to review this film. I was hoping it would be in his style with the humor and the satire, but wit and levity are nowhere to be found in this hour and a half plus documentary.

“…you walk away feeling bleak and powerless…”

The film’s only funny moment comes when Gibbs goes to a concert that’s supposedly powered exclusively by solar energy, but when the show gets rained on, the crew switches over to a coal-fueled energy grid. That reveal juxtaposed with the hippie-ish concert-goers and performers got a good chuckle out of me, but I’m not 100% sure that was the intention.

I was absolutely educated by Planet of the Humans, but I was not entertained. I was not emotionally moved. I was not inspired to fight for change, and I was not shown any feasible solutions to the problems presented. The documentary is competently made from a filmmaking standpoint, but it just feels so hollow and empty. I wanted to like this movie, and I really wanted it to be something I could recommend to people because these subjects are important. They do need to be covered and discussed, but not in this utterly nihilistic way.