Czechia Deforested

Mikoláš Arsenjev / Czech Republic / 2020 / 14 min.

synopsis

The current climate crisis is feeding into the massive spread of the bark beetle, and it is already clear that it cannot be stopped. Entire forests are being cut down all across the Czech Republic, leaving huge clearings in their wake, and after mammoth mining machines come in to do their dirty work, all that remains is desolate, suffocated land. “What we're demonstrating here is that it’s all just ‘a numbers game’ of who can mine the most cubic metres and what company can make the biggest fortune.” What problems will a new treeless landscape bring us? Barren landscapes are places we tend to look away from. This visually refined, black and white reportage film tries to convey the physical experience of mining and the clearings we create on a daily basis. It also poses an alarming question: “Do we really care about the forest?”