“Can you imagine what would happen if we took these young folks [and] got them involved in elections? And young people were the reason why certain politicians won or lost in the 2020 elections,” Sunrise Movement’s Varshini Prakash emphasizes in our unique clip of Rachel Lears’ “To the End.” The spot sees the new era of environmental activists – from youngsters to younger adults – gathered for the Youth Climate Strike in New York. “Don’t destroy the world,” one protestor’s signal reads, “Fighting for our future,” reads one other.
Following “Knock Down the House,” Lears’ 2019 portrait of 4 girls working for Congress, “To the End” follows 4 younger WOC changemakers campaigning for the Green New Deal (GND), the most pivotal local weather change laws in American historical past.
“To the End” reunites Lears with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, whereas additionally that includes the work of Prakash, GND coverage author Rhiana Gunn-Wright, and political strategist Alexandra Rojas of the Justice Democrats. Filmed over a four-year span of “hope and crisis,” the doc follows these girls from road protests to the halls of congress as they “defend their generation’s right to a future,” per its synopsis.
When requested what differentiates the Sunrise Movement from others, Prakash, who serves as exec director, says, “We are building an army of young people to stop the climate crisis and create millions of good jobs for our generation.” She provides, “We are both a social movement but we’re also political movement.”
“While the situation is grave, we haven’t reached the apocalypse yet — and there’s still so much we can do to build a better world. But there is no path to stopping the global climate crisis that doesn’t involve engaging with politics in the United States,” Lears advised us. “‘To the End’ frames our protagonists’ fight for a just and sustainable future as an epic coming of age story of courageous young women confronting multiple dystopian dimensions — climate disaster itself, the corporate media, and the Kafkaesque world of Washington, DC politics.”
“To the End” is now in theaters. The movie premiered at Sundance earlier this yr.
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