New documentary highlights role of personal lifestyle choices in fighting climate change

Filmmaker John Webster’s family lived for a year without petroleum

print this

By Harri Römpötti
     
      “If climate change really is a fashionable subject, then we Finns are still at the bobby-socks level”, says John Webster.
     Webster’s documentary Recipe for Disaster had its premiere at the Espoo Ciné festival on Sunday. In the movie, the director, who is concerned about climate change, put his family on a petroleum fast for a year. Plastic is made out of oil, so anything made out of plastic had to be avoided like the plague.
     Try to find a toothbrush that has no plastic! The Websters had a hard time during the winter.
     
The Websters’ climate awakening did not end with the completion of the documentary. Now John Webster is building an eco-friendly house for his family in Espoo.
     “The surroundings of the house will become part of its energy solutions. The windows will be situated in such a way that sunlight is utilised as well as possible. There will be a birch tree in front of the house, which will provide shade in the summer, but which is leafless in the winter, letting the light through. There will not be any mechanical air conditioning”, Webster explains.
      There will be a separate sauna in the yard. In that way, it will not be necessary to keep a space warm that is used perhaps once a week. He is assembling up a wooden sauna in the yard out of logs 100 years old - recycled material, you see.
     “Residential energy solutions right after transport, are the biggest issue with which an ordinary person can affect his or her impact on the climate. The new house will consume only half of the energy that is spent in our apartment.”
     
Webster did not start building the house out of climatic considerations alone. The family had planned the project for a long time, and energy conservation is not exclusively an ideological matter. Webster notes that it also saves money.
     Building it is more expensive than with an ordinary house, but this will retain its value better. Ten years form now it might be necessary to live in a lower-emission society than now, and when that happens, these solutions will be mandatory.”
     For instance, setting up a heat pump system costs three times as much as installing direct electric heating, but Webster calculates that it will pay for itself in ten years in the form of lower electric bills.
     
The Websters have also changed their transportation habits. The children have been placed in a neighbourhood school, and the car mostly stays in the garage. John Webster will not easily board a plane, as flying increases a person’s ecological footprint considerably.
     Tickets for the premiere of Recipes for Disaster was sold out well in advance, which is not bad for a documentary. But the movie is not simply a grim indictment of Western lifestyles, although John Webster’s wife Anu calls the director a climate preacher.
     
At 41 years of age, Webster is known for his amusing documentaries with a human touch. His Pölunimurikauppiaat (“Vacuum Cleaner Salesmen”) from 1993 is a classic that people still watch. This time as well, it is clear that humour is necessary. Webster was simply surprised at how much of it fell to him.
     “I knew that I cannot find out about everything before I start to make a film. We made it without planning, keeping hold of the moment. Going overboard was significant, even though such events could not be predicted. The film shows the learning process.”
     “I never would have guessed how many of my own decisions would be irrational. Knowledge increases pain, and I went overboard. It was hard to say how much of an idiot one can be. Anu is the heroine of this film, because she managed to take it.”
     
Webster’s extreme thoughts provide humour for the viewer. For instance, there was no point in throwing away old plastic goods. In fact, plastic ties down the carbon inside oil, and as such, does not affect climate change very much.
     “I ended up focussing on plastic too much. There is a danger that it is the only thing that will stay in people’s minds. However, plastic is also a reminder of how dependent we are on oil. Besides, plastic stays in the food chain for 100,000 years. When our whole civilisation has gone, the plastic wrappings will still be left”, Webster points out.
     Nor is Webster any longer the bright-eyed fundamentalist that he was in the wildest scenes of his film. In it, he has many roles: that of father, husband, director, cinematographer, sound man, and protagonist.
     The conversations were shot with a single camera, which John and Anu passed back and forth to each other. Thus, the family spent a year as virtual laboratory animals.
     
Now Webster sounds quite moderate. His passion is stirred only when he wonders why nobody has done anything about the climate problem. But Webster is not expecting anyone to go to extremes.
     “One of the messages of my film is that something needs to be done, but that nobody has to be perfect. All people must find their limits on how to reduce greenhouse emissions without ruining their lives.”
     If Webster were to make his film now, he would pay more attention to the environmental impact of food. But vegetarianism, for instance, would feel a bit too absolute for him. Much can be achieved just by reducing meat consumption.
     
Recipes for Disaster delivers its message in an amusing package, even though there are plenty of cold facts to back it up. Websters personal inverse example emphasises consideration and moderation.
     The film will also be distributed internationally. In addition to Finland, financing came from France, Britain, Canada, Spain, Israel, Denmark, and Norway. Recipes for Disaster will be televised in all of those countries.
     Thanks to the French Canal +, the film will also be shown in French-speaking Africa. Webster ponders what the climate-friendly life of a family in Espoo might look like from the perspective of people there.
     Webster has not yet decided on the exact topic of his next documentary, but he does not plan to give up on the climate change issue.
     
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 24.8.2008


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Farewell (and good riddance?) to cheap oil (10.8.2008)

Links:
  Millennium film: Recipes for Disaster

HARRI RÖMPÖTTI / Helsingin Sanomat