Antarctica: Ice and Sky

Antarctica: Ice and Sky

The documentary, “Antarctica: Ice and Sky,” strings together old footage of researchers doing research in the freezing cold of Antarctica from the 1950s through the ’80s. It’s a simple but effective way to counter those who deny human-made climate change or claim it falls within normal variation. Whenever such an argument is made, it’s usually based on a belief that the science is wrong or the scientists are only doing it for money or some other claim that impugns either their methods or their integrity.

But this question “What are you going to do?” stands out as one of those moments where the film veers a little too close to being yet another call to action without enough thought behind it (though not so far as website-bridging-texting pleas, which are even more pandering because they make viewers feel like they’ve done something when they really haven’t). This is because Luc Jacquet didn’t make a work of direct activism; in fact, he never earned his last-minute attempt at turning it into one.

The rest of Lorius’ life was spent in Antarctica and doing what was necessary to return there. He participated in 20 expeditions over the course of his career. He was awarded medals by France’s top scientific bodies, and his name became synonymous with studying ice cores from polar regions for clues about past climates and how humans might be affecting them now.

Lorius, played by Michel Papineschi throughout much of the film, spends most of his time sitting around various parts of Antarctica at age 81 while Jacquet’s camera pans across landscapes that have visibly changed since Lorius worked there. In one shot that moves from following Lorius walking along some snowy terrain up to some barren gray mountains (the only description I could think up for them), we see less and less snow until finally we’re looking down into a valley where there’s no snow at all, just a little stream of water trickling along.

We know it’s wrong because of the film’s long shots that cover three decades on the continent. Most of the movie is made up of this footage, as Lorius spends months at a time in Antarctica with his various expeditions and research teams, driving across it in snow vehicles that are so small their compartments can barely fit a person who is sitting upright.

The temperatures are deadly (he tells of Russian researchers setting barrels of oil on fire so the fuel will turn back into liquid). The vehicles have to drive over hidden crevasses covered by a thin layer of snow and ice, and the detection equipment keeps breaking. The wind blows down the mast above the underground station where the only way to put it back up is for him to take off his gloves and use his bare hands to handle nuts and bolts.

What changed everything was when he figured out how to develop an ice corer that could bring back ice from thousands of meters below, which in geological terms means hundreds of thousands of years ago. His greatest discovery made by dropping some ancient ice into celebratory glasses filled with whiskey was that air from the time when the ice formed was still trapped inside it. Lorius went to Antarctica for the first time when he was 23 mainly because it sounded fun (“Wonder” becomes a repeated note in the narration), but he ends up being an example for how professional science often happens by accident.

Late in life, he wonders what any of this work, all these awards, all these warnings even mean if they’re not listened to. In one montage near film’s end, we see him get accolades at conference upon conference upon conference around the world that have done nothing literally not one thing about any bigger issue than this planet could offer to a man whose job has been studying its climate systems for most of his life. If anything, what I think this movie wants us to agree with is that we don’t have the ability to see that. And it is starting over, from that point of view, that is our only chance.

It’s possible, as “Antarctica: Ice and Sky” says. When Lorius’ team discovered they could date every nuclear weapon test by measuring radioactive material in Antarctic ice, an international treaty was signed banning them, with more than 100 nations joining. His most important work came during the Cold War, when France collaborated with the U.S. and Soviet Union on this research. If people then could put their differences aside long enough to recognize how much those answers mattered Kardashians or no Kardashians surely we can do it now.

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