Earth Day Celebrated with Awareness-Raising Factual Content

Ahead of Earth Day, Netflix premiered Our Great National Parks, a new docuseries that explores breathtaking national parks around the world and the wildlife that live within them, narrated by none other than former U.S. President Barack Obama. Across its five episodes, the series’—and Obama’s—message is clear: the preservation of our shared planet and its natural wonders should be a paramount priority for us all. 

Netflix is far from being the only media entity tying content to Earth Day in an effort to raise awareness about all matters relating to the planet and its protection. WaterBear Network, a free streaming and impact platform dedicated to supporting the UN Sustainable Development Goals, has an Earth Day theme this year: invest in our planet, which is “encouraging everyone to act (boldly), innovate (broadly) and implement (equitably) for the protection of planet Earth,” says Ellen Windemuth, CEO of WaterBear Network. “At WaterBear, we offer content that inspires action to address critical socio-environmental issues.”

New releases on the platform include Eve: the off-grid life of a nine-year-old climate activist; Trashed, in which Jeremy Irons sets out to discover the extent and effects of the global waste problem; Last of My Kind, a short film that tells the story of Martin Palmer, who leads a service to mourn species that have become extinct; Home, a documentary that shows how closely linked man and nature are and how humanity is threatening the planet’s ecological balance; and The Organic Life, about who grows our food and how.

WaterBear Network also partnered with Outdoor Channel Asia on an exclusive Earth Day 2022 marathon of original WaterBear programming as well as select Outdoor Channel originals and acquisitions. “The marathon features some of our most popular original content spanning biodiversity, climate action, food waste and sustainable fashion,” says Windemuth. “We’ve also included some of our Impact productions around wildlife protection, which we’ve produced with NGO partners.”

WaterBear is also launching a partnership with 5 Media, with a bespoke Earth Day content row on the platform, and recently entered a brand partnership with the outdoor apparel, footwear and equipment brand Jack Wolfskin, which will see it launch its dedicated channel featuring content about the preservation, restoration and expansion of wildlands, wild animals and wild plants on the WaterBear platform and app in May.

Love Nature is celebrating the planet with a coordinated month-long campaign across linear and online platforms worldwide. On Earth Day (April 22), it will premiere The Accidental Wilderness: Europe’s Everglades across its global linear, FAST and YouTube channels. Love Nature linear channels around the world kicked off Earth Week with wall-to-wall series and documentaries that highlight the natural beauty of Earth’s wildlife, including After the Wildfires, Pridelands: Wilderness Reborn, Rewilding and A Wild Year on Earth. Further, Love Nature launched a one-month-only pop-up channel, Love Earth, in the U.S. on VIZIO’s WatchFree+.

Global factual content distributor TVF International currently represents a number of films and series aligned with Earth Day that focus on environmental protection and activism. These titles include RTÉ’s Eco-Eye: Sustainable Solutions, which offers a positive outlook as it highlights the changes we can make in our everyday lives; Climate for Change, which shows how organizations around the world are utilizing technology to develop a “circular economy” for their materials and products; and Carbon: The Unauthorised Biography, from Genepool Productions and Handful of Films, which is told from the voice of the titular element.

Explorer: The Last Tepui, one of National Geographic’s Earth Day specials that will launch exclusively on Disney+, follows elite climber Alex Honnold (Free Solo) and a climbing team led by National Geographic Explorer and climber Mark Synnott as they attempt a first-ascent climb up a 1,000-foot sheer cliff in the Amazon jungle on a mission to bring biologist and National Geographic Explorer Bruce Means to the top of a massive, biodiverse tepui.

“What makes Explorer: The Last Tepui so special is that we had the opportunity to follow someone who had dedicated his life to exploring, discovering and understanding one of the most biodiverse places on Earth, and we needed to utilize cutting-edge adventure and climbing—with Alex Honnold on the sharp end—to bring us to the places that had never been seen before,” says Taylor Rees, co-director. “The adventure story itself is so riveting that it’s easy to forget you’re learning about the jungle ecosystem along the way!”

Among NHK Enterprises’ Earth Day highlights, Resurgence of the Seas: Natural Spectacles in Northern Waters delves into sustainable fishing efforts on the Japanese island of Hokkaido. 

“The latest technology in underwater filming captures nature’s spectacles in the oceans of Hokkaido, the fruits of decades of fisheries management efforts by the local fishing community,” says Hiroumi Tsuruzono, the director of NHK Enterprises’ hatural history programs department. “This title sought to convey the positive changes that have been brought about by humans rethinking their relationship with nature. It has been pointed out that Japan’s overfishing practices are a major cause of the depletion of marine resources, but the media, including us, have been slow to pursue this issue and the government has not exerted much power. However, we are trying to tell people that some parts of the fishery are slowly making progress, as the fishermen themselves see it as an issue of their own survival and continue to discuss it with each other.”

There’s no doubt among those in the business of making, distributing and showcasing factual content that it has a considerable part to play in raising awareness about environmental matters and protecting the Earth and its inhabitants. Connecting this content to viewers involves, among other considerations, being conscious of how the methods of production match up with its message and mission. 

“Knowing that viewers do their due diligence and expect that a film addressing environmental issues will ensure its own impact is minimal in this regard” is key, according to Lindsey Ayotte, head of strategic development at TVF International. “This means not flying crews all over the world to film, for example. It’s very important for films in this space to have integrity. In that sense, we’ve seen more and more productions that are hyper-local—maybe focused on one specific region or one specific species. Our film Malaysia’s Last Tigers is a good example of this.”

WaterBear’s Windemuth believes that Covid-19 has had a hand in creating a closer relationship between the planet and its people. “There’s been a significant increase in sustainability programming in recent years raising awareness of key socio-environmental issues,” she says. “The pandemic strengthened humans’ relationship with the environment, even as the climate crisis grows more urgent. We’re seeing a shift from programs based on facts to more emotive and empathetic stories with a sharp focus on individual characters that people can connect to.”

At Love Nature, Staudt has also noticed the power of a strong emotional connection, pointing to the ways in which natural-history programs’ animals and landscapes can have a meaningful impact on audiences. “The reason why our series and documentaries connect is because Love Nature leans into compelling storytelling with a strong focus on the animal characters,” she explains.

Filmmaker Rees has witnessed a tide shift in which environmental films have embraced themes of hope and steer away from the doom and gloom. “They show the truths but through the eyes of real characters we can connect with more deeply and care about,” Rees says. “We need this sense of wonder and possibility to continue moving forward in the face of such daunting realities as climate change, loss of biodiversity and pollution in our waters, food systems and bodies. Only wonder will give us the strength needed to keep innovating and not give up.”

As NHK’s Tsuruzono put it, “I believe that nature programs have a beauty that moves people and a fragility that inspires them. As a young man, I was one of them.”