The environmental impact of filmmaking

In our digital age of movie and television consumption, the language we use to talk about engaging with moving images has transformed. We ‘stream’ shows. Images are projected onto ‘green’ screens. Many of us who use computers – filmmakers, broadcasters, and audiences alike – store files on the ‘cloud.’ With digital’s organically coded vocabulary evoking water and air, the harmful mass production of analogue technologies, such as plastic film strips and DVDS, might seem like a relic from the past.

However, the environmental costs of Hollywood filmmaking are still very real and not all digital infrastructures are eco-friendly. Digital screen media rely on extracting precious metals, sweatshop labour, ‘high energy demand’ and e-waste that’s dumped in the Global South. So, what can this $100 billion global industry do to change?

It’s a question that many industry figures and academics are determined to answer. New roles such as ‘green runners’ have emerged on film sets, alongside companies like Sustainable Film, which help productions to source greener materials and recycle assets. Carbon-neutral certification for UK-based productions and toolkits to calculate carbon emissions are being used and grassroots practitioners are organising themselves to bring about positive change.

The Project

The Environmental Impact of Filmmaking Project is an Open Societal Challenge project at The Open University, led by Dr Rebecca Harrison. The project supports the UK screen industries in adopting more sustainable practices across a range of activities – focusing first on prop and costume making. It does so by exploring good practice and areas for improvement via archival research, interviews, a focus group, and collaboration with industry partners. Beyond its main aim to lower the environmental impact of filmmaking, the project has three other goals. First is to respond to skills and knowledge gaps in the screen sector and the burgeoning interest among filmmakers in sustainability. Second is to discuss global inequalities brought about by the extraction and export of raw materials, fossil fuel use, and labour practices. And third is to create an archive of interviews with Star Wars and other industry practitioners so that researchers can learn more about both life on set and changing attitudes toward sustainability.

Working with BAFTA albert, the project team brings together expertise in film history and environmental sciences. We’ll be sharing the resources we create with filmmakers; the hope is that our work to uncover the practices of the past will underpin more sustainable ways of working in future. In the first stage of the project, we’ll be examining the lifecycles of droids, dresses, and props made for the Star Wars franchise.

What’s so special about Star Wars?

From the desert of Tatooine, where Luke Skywalker worked on his family’s moisture farm in A New Hope (1977), to the brutal cold of Hoth (The Empire Strikes Back, 1980), the first Star Wars movies were interested in extreme environmental conditions. Then, in The Last Jedi (2017), Resistance fighter Rose described the negative impact that colonial forces’ mining activities have on her community. And in 2019, The Rise of Skywalker featured war debris that had altered tidal patterns and coastal landscapes. It’s a franchise, then, that has always engaged with environmental concerns and the politics of sustainability onscreen.

The saga’s impact on planet Earth warrants closer attention though, as its success relies on the very activities that its storylines tend to critique. Digital equipment relies on extracting silicon from sand to make computer chips; sets need fossil fuel energy for lighting; oil-derived plastics are used to make costumes. That’s not to suggest that the franchise is environmentally worse than other screen media – rather, it’s fairly typical of big-budget productions.

The longevity of Star Wars is significant because its production encompasses pre- and post-digital techniques. It therefore allows us to make comparisons that will help filmmakers understand whether digital props and costumes are greener than analogue. For example, we can contrast an Artoo Detoo costume made from aluminium in 1976 with a virtual version of the character created with software for Attack of the Clones (2002). By assessing each of the materials used, and accounting for manufacturing at different points in time, we can support practitioners in deciding which approach best suits their sustainability goals.

Looking to the Future

The Environmental Impact of Filmmaking project is one of many UK initiatives working toward greener screen industries. There are many more around the world, too, including projects run by Green Projections in Colombia and the Centre for Environmental Research & Education in India. With no single fix for the problem of climate change, it’s vital that resources are not only shared by wealthy filmmaking nations, but also that solutions address the needs and specific cultural contexts of users. Moreover, with representations of environmental crisis increasing onscreen (for instance, in recent episodes of Googlebox and EastEnders), it’s imperative that the film and television industries play their part in sustaining the liveability of the planet – and audiences’ hope that things can and will change for the better.