Our next section
of Ecocinema and the City, “Urban
Nature and Interdependence” begins to elucidate more positive relationships
between human and nonhuman nature. The films examined in the urban nature and
interdependence section demonstrate the interdependent possibilities of
biophilic urbanism. Biologists Bjørn
Grinde and Grete Grindal Patil draw on E.O. Wilson’s biophilia hypothesis to
reinforce the benefits humans gain from affiliating with nonhuman nature, both
through interdependent relationships and sustainable urban living conditions.
Wilson defines biophilia “as the innate tendency to focus on life and lifelike
processes” (Biophilia 1). Urban
and environmental planner Timothy Beatley asserts that this affiliation with the natural world provides
“social, psychological, pedagogical, and other benefits,” even in urban areas
(211). “Urban Nature and Interdependence” showcases films exploring zoos,
birdwatching, and urban gardens and highlights moves toward such biophilic
urbanism.
Chapter 5,
“Hatari Means Danger: Filmic Representations of Animals Welfare and
Environmentalism at the Zoo” examines how zoo films with differing perspectives
beg the same question: Does Hatari mean
danger for humans or for the animals they capture and enclose for their own
enjoyment? Although African safari films like Howard Hawks’ Hatari (1962) seem to promote trapping
wild animals for human amusement in zoos or some other enclosure, and fictional
zoo-centered films such as We Bought a
Zoo (2011) and Zookeeper (2011) emphasize the benefits to humans
provided by animals and a zoo setting, they also highlight, at least
peripherally, the educational roles zoos have always held. Documentaries such
as Zoo (1993), Nenette (2010), and Blackfish (2013), however, provide a
more complex view of zoo life, revealing the detriments to animal welfare
caused by captivity, as well as the complicated relationship humans have with
entrapped wild creatures.
Chapter 6,
“Eco-Therapy in Central Park: Documenting Urban Birdwatching” explores how the
interdependence a union between humans and nature suggests also coincides with
human improvement in three bird watching documentaries: Pale Male (2002), The Legend
of Pale Male (2009), and Birders: The Central Park Effect (2012).
Whether they anthropomorphize the birds on display—as do Pale Male and The Legend of
Pale Male—or display them in spectacular close up—as does Birders: The Central Park Effect—these
urban birding documentaries highlight the multiple ways birding helps humanity.
Despite their human approaches to ecology, however, all three films also
demonstrate how these Central Park birds may inadvertently save themselves by
healing their birders’ environmental grief.
Chapter 7,
“Green Lungs: Partnering with Nature in the Urban Garden Film” examines how the
U.S. animated feature Mr. Bug Goes to
Town (1941), the Vietnamese family melodrama The Scent of Green Papaya (1993), and the Peruvian drama The Milk of Sorrow (2009) demonstrate
the interdependent possibilities of biophilic urbanism, although resting on
varied visions of the “garden.” These films highlight the effectiveness of
relationships between human and nonhuman nature that are more like the
partnership ethic environmental historian Carolyn Merchant proposes or the
re-constructed garden ideal ecocritic Joni Adamson recommends.
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