Blanche Monet "Manufactured Landscapes" is an interesting documentary about Edward Burtynsky who specializes in taking photographs of industry and manufacturing in an attempt to warn against the environmental depletion of the planet. The film itself is mainly focused on China which is in the process of transforming itself from an agrarian society to an industrial power. There are consequences to this course of action, especially in the displacement of the population and increased pollution.

doctorsmoothlove Edward Burtynsky is a Canadian photographer, especially famous for his depictions of industrial landscapes. His work has granted him cult-like devotion from his mostly local fans until this film was released last year. While his work isn't in the mainstream chic, it has gained a much larger following than it had previously. The film Manufactured Landscapes is a collection of Burtynsky's photos of the industrial countryside of China and other places.Edward's photos are renowned for the subliminal beauty they contain. Nevertheless, this beauty doesn't translate well to the motion-picture format. While the images are breathtaking, they are strewn together with little expository commentary. The images are supposed to relate to the descriptions Edward provides and they do most times. However, not all images are explained sufficiently. I wouldn't expect all the images to receive commentary, but descriptions near the bottom of the screen would have aided the film in effectively communicating as the book does (I feel able to include this statement given that Burtynsky has published a print version of the film).Baichwal employs a naturalistic approach to film-making. Her camera work is reminiscent of hand-held work of Cannibal Holocaust and The Blair Witch Project. The dialog, presumably between Burtynsky and his crew (or locals from his current location) is realistic and perhaps unscripted. The film has no plot, protagonists, nor created sets. So as you may imagine, it is able to progress forward in any direction it chooses. While this approach is unique, it isn't very effective. The pictures appear quickly and Burtynsky discusses them, then he moves to another location (usually in China) and interviews residents or presents new photographs. The audience is forced to rely on the images themselves to convey Baichwal's and Burtynsky's joined message. The images appear consecutively, and mimic the process of viewing them in a book, but without knowledge of their identity, which lessens their effect. I must also admit that Baichwal does provide a large collection of images of modern China, regardless of how overwhelming it may be. While I wish the film did not move to so many places in favor of many photographs of one place, this technique is inconsequential. Edward mentions that he wishes to portray China's new identity as an objective observer. It has no political stance. Manufactured Landscapes is a wonderful example of the necessary distinction between enthusiasm and skill. Edward Burtynsky's photographs are provocative and Baichwal appears to appreciate his photos but this material isn't able to translate into a ninety minute film. The material is not adapted properly into its new artistic format. The images are the focus, when the film format would encourage Burtynsky to discuss his work. The photographs are rightly given full attention in a print source. Perhaps the motion picture would have succeeded in this transition if Burtynsky had described his experiences with references to the images. Their stark appearance on screen is a microcosm of the film's unfortunate ineptitude. P.S. I was able to locate a copy of the Manufactured Landscapes picture book, and I give it my heartiest recommendation.

Roedy Green The documentary opens with a pan inside a Chinese factory that seems to go on for hours and hours. The enormity of the factory is unbelievable. It is packed with young Chinese people all in bright yellow uniforms.Later you see swarms of these yellow-uniformed young people forced to line up in rows like school children, where they are chastised for insufficient production. It is like an enormous prison or an ant hill. You wonder, what happens to these people when they hit 25. The movie does not answer.There are many other scenes of Chinese industry, from container docks, shipyards, mines, and a coal mine far as the eye can see past mists on the horizon.There is almost no narration. What little there is is often in Chinese with subtitles. And the cameraman tries to find an artistic beauty in the piles of industrial waste.Another scene that stuck in my mind was the manual processing of North America's e-waste. Every computer is smashed into components, every little pin on every chip pulled off one by one and all the metals sorted, all by hand in filthy conditions, surrounded in lead, cadmium, mercury and other dangerous heavy metals that have so contaminated the ground water it is poisonous.The movie offers no political or environmental commentary but to me China is clearly on the wrong track. They are building a new coal-fired plant each week. They are trying to convert from 90% rural to 70% urban with frantic building of high rises. It is as if they have plugged their ears to the coming realities -- peak oil and global climate change.Instead they need to move food production and consumption closer together. They need buildings that don't require energy -- highly insulated, no more than 7 stories high so people can climb stairs rather than rely on elevators.The movie also showed an old oil tanker being taken apart by hand in Bangladesh. Children and teens swim in the crude oil sludge to collect the dregs. Nobody lives past 30 in this occupation.The movie spells out no explicit message, but the implicit one is that our life style depends on an almost prison-like culture in the third world and scarring of the earth on a stupendous scale.Much of the sound track reminds me of some rhythmic squeaky mechanical device that needs oil. It drives you almost insane. I imagine many people will walk out of this movie because of it. I think the director is trying to condition you to find the images repulsive. She overdoes it.The experience is much like being a child. You see all manner of strange machines and activities, almost nothing explained. It overwhelms with awe and dread.I think this movie would be best viewed on DVD, where you can turn down the sound, and the images will not be so overwhelmingly depressing.

Bob Taylor I have been an admirer of Edward Burtynsky's work for years, and it was such a pleasure to be able to see the man at work, thanks to Jennifer Baichwal's documentary. The severe beauty of the ship-breaking yard in Bangladesh, the stone quarry in Vermont, the enormous assembly plant in China, the beleaguered old neighbourhoods in Shanghai that are just waiting to be torn down: these landscapes are captured so well by the photographer and the filmmaker.At times I thought of old TV documentaries on abandoned coal mines and plastic-mold factories; the sort of stuff I grew up watching. Burtynsky's work has the great value of pointing out how the industrial activity has only shifted to Asia, it has not stopped. The strangest scene for me was the computer scrap-yard somewhere in China--the waste had a threatening air about it, while the workers were very jovial.