Manufactured Landscapes

Jennifer Baichwal's documentary on Canadian photographic artist Edward Burtynsky opens with an inside tracking shot of a massive factory in Cankun, China, where a small army of workers assiduously go about their assigned tasks. The sequence lasts some eight minutes, and nicely sets the scene for this introduction to Burtynsky's pictures focusing on massive construction projects that are replacing the natural landscape. In following the artist's footsteps as he moves from site to site—particularly in China as it undergoes an economic explosion—Manufactured Landscapes, like it's subject's photos, captures images that are simultaneously awesome, humbling, and often terrifying, including a mountain of discarded computer parts in a small town where obsolete machines are systematically disassembled, a vision of hulks of partially cannibalized ships sitting on shore like beached metal whales, and (most powerful of all), the sight of villages being torn down brick by brick by their own residents to make way for a huge reservoir. Of course, Baichwal's object isn't just to document the monumental changes brought about by industrialization and modernization, but also to spotlight Burtynsky's artful chronicle of these events through his photos, which aren't overtly political, but certainly offer a sense of the immense cost this latest industrial revolution is having on the natural world. Highly recommended. [Note: DVD extras include six additional scenes with optional commentary by Jennifer Baichwal (40 min.), a discussion with Baichwal and subject Edward Burtynsky (19 min.), a nine-minute segment featuring Al Gore at the Nashville Film Festival, an interview with cinematographer/collaborator Peter Mettler (5 min.), a stills gallery with commentary by Burtynsky, and trailers. Bottom line: a fine extras package for a fine doc.] (F. Swietek)