Earth has entered a new geological epoch in its 4.5-billion year history. Just as the Pleistocene gave way to the Holocene 12,000 years ago, our planet is now in the “Anthropocene,” characterized by the pervasive effects of human impact on a global scale.

Exploring this “Human Epoch” — how we got here and what it means for our future survival — is the subject of Anthropocene, an artful and meditative new documentary, third in a series from the filmmaking team of Jennifer Baichwal, Nicholas de Pencier, and Edward Burtynsky.

From Siberia to the Great Barrier Reef, Anthropocene explores the ways our technologies, settlements, and patterns of consumption and waste have altered every environment and ecosystem on the planet. The camera captures beautiful, striking, and terrifying images of the awesome power and epic scale of modern human enterprises. From open-pit mining in Germany to vast lithium processing fields in Chile, from China’s great sea wall to Nairobi’s sprawling landfills, humanity has literally become a geological force: we are terraforming our own planet through everything we do.

More often than not, these changes are found to be both dangerous — to humans or other life forms — and irreversible. The film strives to end with a hopeful message: As with any sort of addiction, recognizing the problem may be the first step towards positive change. But other than an upbeat folk song to accompany the closing credits, little evidence of progress can be found.

From the November 2019 issue of Planning Magazine.