Al Gore’s ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ Gets a Sequel Just in Time for Sundance
Al Gore is one of those people who gets me thinking about legacy. When Gore’s time on the earth comes to a close, how will he be remembered? As a solid vice president who lost one of the most hotly disputed elections of all time? Or as a champion of environmental conservationism? From the outside, it certainly appears that Gore is angling for the latter. Just this past weekend, it was announced by Paramount Pictures (via Variety) that Al Gore has been working on a sequel to his 2006 documentary An Inconvenient Truth and that the film was set to be the opening night film at next year’s Sundance Film Festival.
If it seems odd to hear that a documentary will be opening one of the country’s biggest film festivals, you have to remember that An Inconvenient Truth is no normal documentary. Gore’s original film was the rare documentary to achieve crossover commercial success, grossing more than $24 million at the box office in 2006 and sparking a national conversation about climate change that continues to this day. Not only did the film win two Academy Awards (one for Best Documentary and one for Best Original Song ) it also played in over 500 theaters across the country. For comparison’s sake, Weiner — one of the best documentaries of 2016 and one of the titles on the Oscar shortlist — topped out at 88 screens this past summer.
How you feel about a sequel to the original film depends a bit on how you feel about the issues. If you are pleased that climate change continues to receive mainstream attention and that people like Al Gore are working diligently to show the science behind it, then you might look forward to the film. On the other hand, if you’re frustrated that this is a conversation at all — given the sheer volume of science behind the veracity of climate change — you might see this film as just another opportunity for deniers to conflate the issue with the people involved in it. We’ll see what the new film and the new year have in store.
As part of the news, Al Gore also released a statement on the film:
Now more than ever we must rededicate ourselves to solving the climate crisis. But we have reason to be hopeful; the solutions to the crisis are at hand. I’m deeply honored and grateful that Paramount Pictures and Participant Media have once again taken on the task of bringing the critical story of the climate crisis to the world.
The sequel to An Inconvenient Truth will hit theaters at some time in 2017.