It Ain't Easy Being Green

Some People seem to forget that the environmental movement started way back in the 60’s. Back then people who recycled or tried to save the rain forest were dismissed as hippies and tree huggers, now everyone from middle-class house wives to oil companies recycle in one way or another.

Released in 1972, Silent Running was way ahead of its time and still holds its own as a powerful rallying call for people who don’t want to see the forests vanish from the earth.

Set in an unspecified future the film tells the story of Freeman Lowell, a botanist aboard the space freighter Valley Forge. The ship is carrying the last remaining forests from the earth in huge bio-domes in an attempt to preserve them against the industrial wasteland we have made of the planet. Lowell’s is an idealist; he loves the forest and finds himself constantly at odds with his apathetic ship mates. When the call comes that cut backs have had to be made and that the forests are to be destroyed and the ships returned to commercial use, Lowell can’t accept it. He kills the crew and hijacks the ship, steering it deep into the solar system to try and save the one, last forest.

The film looks awesome, with above average special effects and a refreshingly grimy aesthetic for the post 2001: Space Odyssey era. Admittedly the two robot drones that Lowell has for company after the rest of the crew have been dispatched aren’t really up to much, but they are pretty endearing, even if they do look crude.

The real merit in this film is that you just wouldn’t have anyone around these days with the balls to fund it. It has a real emotional depth to it, essentially being the story of one man’s quest to protect what he loves. There’s also the loneliness and the guilt at having killed his friends eating away at him as he struggles to man the ship on his own and drifts further and further away from earth.

Rightly regarded as a cult classic, Silent Running isn’t some retro oddity, but a film whose message is more important today than it ever has been. Anyone with an interest in science fiction, the environment or the early 70’s counter culture should see this film and be inspired by the sacrifices one man was willing to make to save a forest.