The Truth About An Inconvenient Truth

With the latest proclamation on global warming last week and the hotting-up of the 2008 presidential campaigns, Al Gore and the film An Inconvenient Truth are in the headlines again. Detractors (and fans, for that matter) talk about AIT as being "Al Gore's movie." That's simply not true. The main creative force in film is the director - s/he's the one who has final say on what goes in the film, what stays out, and the meaning of the final product. To a lesser extent, the producer(s) play a similar role. In either case, the subject of a documentary does not fill that role. In the case of AIT, it's director Davis Gugenheim's film. Yes, it is a documentary about Gore's book of the same name and his promo tour for it, but that doesn't make it "Gore's film."

Compare this situation with Michael Moore's film The Big One, a documentary of the promo tour for Moore's book Downsize This!. In that flick, Moore is (as he always is) the star, director, and driving force of the movie. It is about Moore and his views, crafted by him to make the impact he wants. Gore was surely on board with AIT and hoped it would help spread his message. But that just makes him a helpful documentary subject, not the director/producer.