The Curve Of Time, Directed by Jordan Manley, screens as part of Ski Show 2 at the Vancouver International Mountain Film Festival, Centennial Theatre, Thursday, Nov. 9, 7:30 p.m.
The filmmakers behind The Curve Of Time want viewers to know that .55 metric tonnes of carbon dioxide consumption was produced during the making of their documentary.
It’s a simple and effective gesture, appearing as a brief note during the 23-minute documentary’s closing credits, and it relays an important message co-directors and writers Jordan Manley and Daniel Irvine are trying to get across: combating climate change starts with making personal changes and, in some cases, sacrifices.
For more than 10 years, Manley has had the opportunity to travel all over the world to document skiing, outdoor adventures and the sublimity of the Earth’s mountain ranges through his work as an outdoor culture photographer and filmmaker.
But making The Curve Of Time was one of his first forays into producing an outdoor enthusiast film with a clear social message behind it.
“I think the real challenge was trying to create a film that wasn’t preachy or pretentious. There’s an inherent challenge in having professional athletes telling the general public to sort of change their ways,” Manley says. “I think ultimately what we ended up with, I hope, is something that basically demonstrates that each of us we lead different lives but each of us has areas of our lives that we can make an impact. We can amend, and tinker with, and explore new ways of doing things.”
The film follows the exploits of skiers and outdoor aficionados Greg Hill and Chris Rubens, whose jobs – similar to Manley – has essentially been to traverse the world in search of the best powder and spectacular slopes.
The documentary’s opening minutes show Greg and Chris criss-crossing their way through mountains ranging from Japan to Greenland to Revelstoke, B.C. These moments are interspersed with the hosts’ more harrowing realization that the planet is under assault from harmful greenhouse gas emissions.
By the year 2050, ski seasons around the world could be markedly shorter, the pair realize.
“The challenge of climate change is that it’s such a difficult thing to grapple with I think in part because of the scale of it. It’s something very difficult to see. It’s difficult to comprehend the Earth changing so rapidly when it’s been relatively stable for so long. Time is a really kind of critical element in the topic of climate change, so we ended up dwelling on that,” Manley says.
One of the film’s main framing devices is the use of a time capsule-type confession where Greg and Chris both directly address the camera and make a plea to their future selves.
“The goal with using the time capsule as a kind of framing device in the film was to have people think about how they’ll look at their own lives in 30 years in the future, you know, by the time we hit 2050. I think all of us really wanted people to put themselves in that circumstance and think about how we’ll look back on this moment in time,” Manley explains.
The conclusions that Greg and Chris arrive at are simple ones: eat less meat, travel less by plane, take more fuel-efficient transit when available, and ultimately enjoy more of what’s already in one’s own backyard.
“Those guys they hit a point in their lives where they were feeling quite uncomfortable to continue to produce media and going skiing in a particular way where they felt like they were threatening the very thing that sustains them on multiple levels,” Manley says.
The film’s title is borrowed from a similarly named book by M. Wylie Blanchet that charts her exploration of the coastal waters around the Pacific Northwest.
Manley says the title of the film relates to its emphasis on looking at the present and future and the idea of “pulling back and having that perspective on where we’ve from, where we are, and where we’re going.”
The film also makes heavy use of archival footage, such as sound effects, music and brief images from bygone eras. While the footage fits in well with the film’s themes, some of the more alarming images include shots of mountain ranges past and present.
Mount Rainer in 1978, for instance, looks like a livelier, snowier place to be compared to the image presented of the same mountain in 2015.
“We’re at a really pivotal moment in history,” Manley says. “I certainly don’t have the answers, but I think if each of us thought a little bit more about where we’ll be in 2050, than hopefully we’re a little bit better off.”
