Anthropocene: The Human Epoch

Anthropocene: The Human Epoch, directed by Jennifer Baichwal, Edward Burtynsky, and Nicholas de Pencier, is a Canadian documentary, the final entry in a trilogy following Manufactured Landscapes and Watermark, about humanity's massive reshaping of the planet. The film was shot across twenty countries on six continents, including footage of concrete seawalls covering 60 percent of China's coastline, potash mines in Russia, phosphate waste ponds in Florida, and some of the world's largest land machines. It closes with a dedication to Sudan, the world's last male northern white rhinoceros, who died in 2018 shortly after filming. Narrated by Alicia Vikander, the film is part of a larger multidisciplinary project combining art photography, virtual reality, and scientific research; it won Best Canadian Film from the Toronto Film Critics Association. Who it's for: anyone curious about the final film in a documentary trilogy shot across twenty countries, documenting humanity's massive footprint on the planet as part of a broader art and science project. Who it's not for: those wanting an optimistic environmental documentary, since the film chronicles species extinction and the planet's irreversible transformation in a calm but bleak tone.