“Faith lets us believe that we can do something that’s never been done before,” Ben Abbott tells a crowd in Utah where “The Lake” is set, addressing fellow Mormons yet it could be hardly described as preaching to the choir. A biologist that has been studying the Great Salt Lake for years, he is looking to turn around the effects of climate change that have threatened the existence of the lake as droughts have reduced its footprint and the dust left in its wake increasingly looks as if it’s full of harmful carcinogens such as arsenic. It’s an uphill battle in a state where most believe the erosion must be God’s will and farmers rely on the lake to water their crops, making any bid to limit their use of it to preserve it untenable, yet Abbott sees an environment crusade as a religious one as well when he believes the Good Lord entrusted people to be responsible stewards of the land.
The science may be undeniable as it usually is in conservation-minded docs, but the argument is as well in Abby Ellis’ riveting chronicle of the political push to protect the Great Salt Lake as she and her subjects Abbott, fellow biologist Bonnie Baxter and Great Salt Lake Commissioner Greg Steed take on the same question of how to create an appealing narrative for a broad coalition to take action on an environmental crisis. Ellis’s own answer is to craft a meticulous systemic investigation Michael Mann would love, all brilliantly framed handheld camerawork and compelling characters whose professional drive is fueled by personal instinct. Over three years, the director bears witness to the biologists’ transformation into activists simply by raising alarms around what their work is telling them about the potentially catastrophic implications of the Great Salt Lake were to disappear and Steed trying to manage their expectations with what he feels would be feasible in terms of gaining government support. It surely won’t be easy in a state where Governor Spencer Cox declares on television that he plans to host a celebration of the Great Salt Lake in five years when it’s been predicted by the experts to evaporate to prove them wrong. (To the governor’s credit, there’s an unusually amount of access for a film like this to high-level backroom conversations.)
Regardless of the specific issue at hand, “The Lake” is a gripping look at building political consensus when Steed visits various constituencies where it seems like he might as well be talking to a brick wall – as one farmer tells him bluntly, “Do you want food or do you want the lake?” – but the discussions are more productive than anyone might expect when they actually are ongoing, and he worries any headway he makes could be undermined by Abbott, who chases the same goal with a different approach. (An ingenious plan to protect the lake by trying to list an endangered species there seems like a brilliant gambit that would make it a federal issue rather than a state one, but Steed notes the unintended consequences that could come along with that.) Persistence pays off, but also a growing consciousness about meeting people where they are on the issue and Ellis starts observing some interesting bedfellows whose interests align even if their overall beliefs don’t. “The Lake” moves like a freight train even when progress on saving the Great Salt Lake doesn’t seem to. (Editor Emelie Mahdavian, of “Midnight Traveler” and “Heightened Scrutiny,” has a way of finding tension in any environment, whether at home with the scientists, out in the field or inside the state capitol.) Yet it refreshingly doesn’t see doom as inevitable. It certainly is of great concern that the lake could erode, but the film powerfully reflects the end of a healthy dialogue is just as much at stake.
“The Lake” will screen again at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City on January 28th at noon at the Yarrow, January 29th at 9:30 am at the Holiday Village Cinemas and February 1st at 5:30 pm at the Library Center Theatre. It will also be available online via the Sundance platform from January 29th through February 1st.