Kiss the Ground | |
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Directed by | Josh Tickell Rebecca Harrell Tickell |
Narrated by | Woody Harrelson |
Production company | Big Picture Ranch |
Distributed by | Netflix |
Kiss the Ground is a 2020 Netflix original documentary film. It focuses on regenerative agriculture; the movie profiles scientists, farmers and environmentalists as they explore the important role healthier soil plays in better human and planetary health. The film is narrated by actor Woody Harrelson and contains a celebrity cast that includes Gisele Bündchen, Tom Brady, and others.
Directed by Josh Tickell and Rebecca Harrell Tickell, the films are the result of a partnership between Kiss the Ground—a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization headquartered in Los Angeles—and Big Picture Ranch, a film production company based in Ojai, California, northwest of L.A.
The film critiques conventional agriculture, particularly tillage and pesticide use, for its negative environmental effects (soil erosion), role in climate change, and effects on human health. [1] It praises regenerative agriculture as a remedy for improving soil health and carbon sequestration. [1] Jason Mraz, Patricia Arquette, and Ian Somerhalder, among other celebrities involved in climate change activism, appear in interviews in the film. [1]
Critic Natalia Winkelman, reviewing Kiss the Ground for The New York Times , called it "frenetic but ultimately persuasive and optimistic" climate documentary, but criticized its "awkward" condemnation of the U.S. government's absence from climate initiatives without mentioning the Trump administration or any specifics. [1] Kevin Crust of the Los Angeles Times called it "dense but nutritious." [2]
Environmental scientist Ronald G. Amundson, in a commentary for the journal Biogeochemistry, praised "the motivation, enthusiasm, and intentions of the filmmakers and participants" in Kiss the Ground and the earlier Dirt! The Movie (2019), but objected to the films' narrative. [3] Amundson wrote that "a hazy view or wish for a return to a past agricultural utopia ignores that there never was one" and that a global soil management system requires complex, fundamental changes involving many actors, rather than "magical thinking" that the problem will be solved simply by shifts in eating behaviors. [3]
Becca Lucas of the California Climate & Agriculture Network (CalCAN), a group that promotes sustainable agriculture, criticized the film for a simplistic focus on soil depletion as a key to climate change mitigation, writing that the film's narrative propagated "the false and ultimately harmful dichotomy of 'good' versus 'bad' farmer." [4] Lucas also wrote that the film's emphasis on consumer choices (such as composting) was misplaced, as these measures are insufficient to "address our climate crisis at the speed and scale we need." [4] Lucas also criticized the film for failing to engage with the politics and public policy of sustainable agriculture, noting that it did not address programs available to farmers and made only a single brief reference to the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP 21). [4]
Agriculturalist and writer Michelle Miller, writing for Ag Daily, called the film a "missed opportunity"; she praised the focus on regenerative agriculture and combating food waste, but said that the upsides of the film were negated by its hyperbolic "insults and propaganda" directed at conventional agriculture, citing the filmmakers' denunciation of glyphosate, the film's likening of conventional agriculture to Auschwitz, and the film's funding by the Center for Food Safety. [5]
In 2023, the follow-up documentary, Common Ground , premiered. The cast list includes Woody Harrelson, Laura Dern, Jason Momoa, Rosario Dawson, Donald Glover, Ian Somerhalder and more. At the 2023 Tribeca Film Festival, the film won the Human/Nature Award. [6]
Woodrow Tracy Harrelson is an American actor. He first became known for his role as bartender Woody Boyd on the NBC sitcom Cheers (1985–1993), for which he won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series from five nominations. Harrelson received three Academy Award nominations: Best Actor for The People vs. Larry Flynt (1996), and Best Supporting Actor for The Messenger (2009) and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017).
Sustainable agriculture is farming in sustainable ways meeting society's present food and textile needs, without compromising the ability for current or future generations to meet their needs. It can be based on an understanding of ecosystem services. There are many methods to increase the sustainability of agriculture. When developing agriculture within sustainable food systems, it is important to develop flexible business processes and farming practices. Agriculture has an enormous environmental footprint, playing a significant role in causing climate change, water scarcity, water pollution, land degradation, deforestation and other processes; it is simultaneously causing environmental changes and being impacted by these changes. Sustainable agriculture consists of environment friendly methods of farming that allow the production of crops or livestock without causing damage to human or natural systems. It involves preventing adverse effects on soil, water, biodiversity, and surrounding or downstream resources, as well as to those working or living on the farm or in neighboring areas. Elements of sustainable agriculture can include permaculture, agroforestry, mixed farming, multiple cropping, and crop rotation.
Conservation agriculture (CA) can be defined by a statement given by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations as "Conservation Agriculture (CA) is a farming system that can prevent losses of arable land while regenerating degraded lands.It promotes minimum soil disturbance, maintenance of a permanent soil cover, and diversification of plant species. It enhances biodiversity and natural biological processes above and below the ground surface, which contribute to increased water and nutrient use efficiency and to improved and sustained crop production."
Biogeochemistry is the scientific discipline that involves the study of the chemical, physical, geological, and biological processes and reactions that govern the composition of the natural environment. In particular, biogeochemistry is the study of biogeochemical cycles, the cycles of chemical elements such as carbon and nitrogen, and their interactions with and incorporation into living things transported through earth scale biological systems in space and time. The field focuses on chemical cycles which are either driven by or influence biological activity. Particular emphasis is placed on the study of carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, sulfur, iron, and phosphorus cycles. Biogeochemistry is a systems science closely related to systems ecology.
Ian Joseph Somerhalder is an American retired actor. He is known for playing Boone Carlyle in ABC's science fiction adventure drama television series Lost (2004–2010) and Damon Salvatore in the CW supernatural teen drama series The Vampire Diaries (2009–2017).
Clearcutting, clearfelling or clearcut logging is a forestry/logging practice in which most or all trees in an area are uniformly cut down. Along with shelterwood and seed tree harvests, it is used by foresters to create certain types of forest ecosystems and to promote select species that require an abundance of sunlight or grow in large, even-age stands. Logging companies and forest-worker unions in some countries support the practice for scientific, safety and economic reasons, while detractors consider it a form of deforestation that destroys natural habitats and contributes to climate change. Environmentalists, traditional owners, local residents and others have regularly campaigned against clearcutting, including through the use of blockades and nonviolent direct action.
Agroforestry is a land use management system that integrates trees with crops or pasture. It combines agricultural and forestry technologies. As a polyculture system, an agroforestry system can produce timber and wood products, fruits, nuts, other edible plant products, edible mushrooms, medicinal plants, ornamental plants, animals and animal products, and other products from both domesticated and wild species.
The Max Planck Institute for Chemistry is a non-university research institute under the auspices of the Max Planck Society in Mainz, Germany. It was created as the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Chemistry in 1911 in Berlin.
Josh Tickell is an American film director who specializes in movies with a social message. His first feature movie, Fuel won the Sundance Audience Award for Best Documentary, was released theatrically in the United States and became a global sensation gaining over 1 million viewers on Netflix, iTunes, Hulu and CNBC. The movie was screened in the White House for energy and environment staff working in the Obama administration.
Go Further is a 2003 documentary film by Ron Mann starring Woody Harrelson and a group of other environmental activists riding around in a large, bio-fueled bus. The tour was called the Simple Organic Living Tour and it was produced by cause-related marketers the Spitfire Agency. The film debuted at the South by Southwest Film Festival in March 2003, and at the Toronto International Film Festival in September 2003, where it was first runner-up for the People's Choice Award. It was also nominated for a Genie Award for Best Documentary. The film features cameos by Dave Matthews, Natalie Merchant, Ken Kesey, Bob Weir, Michael Franti, Anthony Kiedis, Rob Heydon, Medeski Martin & Wood, and The String Cheese Incident.
Soil health is a state of a soil meeting its range of ecosystem functions as appropriate to its environment. In more colloquial terms, the health of soil arises from favorable interactions of all soil components that belong together, as in microbiota, plants and animals. It is possible that a soil can be healthy in terms of ecosystem functioning but not necessarily serve crop production or human nutrition directly, hence the scientific debate on terms and measurements.
Soil carbon is the solid carbon stored in global soils. This includes both soil organic matter and inorganic carbon as carbonate minerals. It is vital to the soil capacity in our ecosystem. Soil carbon is a carbon sink in regard to the global carbon cycle, playing a role in biogeochemistry, climate change mitigation, and constructing global climate models. Microorganisms play an important role in breaking down carbon in the soil. Changes in their activity due to rising temperatures could possibly influence and even contribute to climate change. Human activities have caused a massive loss of soil organic carbon. For example, anthropogenic fires destroy the top layer of the soil, exposing soil to excessive oxidation.
Rebecca Reynolds Tickell is a producer, director, actress, singer, and environmental activist.
The environmental impact of agriculture is the effect that different farming practices have on the ecosystems around them, and how those effects can be traced back to those practices. The environmental impact of agriculture varies widely based on practices employed by farmers and by the scale of practice. Farming communities that try to reduce environmental impacts through modifying their practices will adopt sustainable agriculture practices. The negative impact of agriculture is an old issue that remains a concern even as experts design innovative means to reduce destruction and enhance eco-efficiency. Animal agriculture practices tend to be more environmentally destructive than agricultural practices focused on fruits, vegetables and other biomass. The emissions of ammonia from cattle waste continue to raise concerns over environmental pollution.
Soil management is the application of operations, practices, and treatments to protect soil and enhance its performance. It includes soil conservation, soil amendment, and optimal soil health. In agriculture, some amount of soil management is needed both in nonorganic and organic types to prevent agricultural land from becoming poorly productive over decades. Organic farming in particular emphasizes optimal soil management, because it uses soil health as the exclusive or nearly exclusive source of its fertilization and pest control.
Regenerative agriculture is a conservation and rehabilitation approach to food and farming systems. It focuses on topsoil regeneration, increasing biodiversity, improving the water cycle, enhancing ecosystem services, supporting biosequestration, increasing resilience to climate change, and strengthening the health and vitality of farm soil.
Ronald Amundson is an American environmental scientist who is currently Professor at University of California, Berkeley.
Carbon farming is a set of agricultural methods that aim to store carbon in the soil, crop roots, wood and leaves. The technical term for this is carbon sequestration. The overall goal of carbon farming is to create a net loss of carbon from the atmosphere. This is done by increasing the rate at which carbon is sequestered into soil and plant material. One option is to increase the soil's organic matter content. This can also aid plant growth, improve soil water retention capacity and reduce fertilizer use. Sustainable forest management is another tool that is used in carbon farming. Carbon farming is one component of climate-smart agriculture. It is also one way to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
Woody Harrelson is an American actor who made his film debut as an uncredited extra in Harper Valley PTA (1978). His breakthrough role was as bartender Woody Boyd on the NBC sitcom Cheers (1985–1993), which garnered Harrelson a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series from a total of five nominations. He would later reprise the character in other television shows, such as Frasier and The Simpsons. In 1992, Harrelson starred opposite Wesley Snipes in White Men Can't Jump. He then appeared in the Oliver Stone-directed Natural Born Killers (1994) alongside Tommy Lee Jones and Robert Downey Jr. For his performance as free-speech activist Larry Flynt in The People vs. Larry Flynt (1996) he was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor and an Academy Award for Best Actor. He next appeared in The Thin Red Line (1998).
Soil carbon sponge is porous, well-aggregated soil in good health, better able to absorb and retain water. Australian microbiologist and climatologist, Walter Jehne, articulated the concept of the soil carbon sponge in his 2017 paper, Regenerate Earth, connecting soil carbon with a restored water cycle able induce planetary cooling through evaporative cooling and higher reflectance of denser green vegetation. Cooling from increased cloud formation is another benefit of soil regeneration anticipated by Jehne.