PGFF Monthly Film: “Ecocide” (Ökozid)

A court drama, as low-key as it is spectacular, about the climate catastrophe. It is 2034, and 31 nations have filed suit against the Federal Republic of Germany claiming damages for the consequences of climate change. Ecocide moves masterfully between the past, present and future, between docudrama and fictional documentary.

The year is 2034. The consequences of climate change are sweeping, and drought and floods have already destroyed the livelihoods of millions of people. After the third consecutive storm surge in a row, the International Court of Justice in The Hague is temporarily moved to Berlin, where the climate catastrophe becomes the subject of a sensational court case.

The claim for damages brought by a coalition of 31 countries of the Global South against the Federal Republic of Germany is represented by two lawyers (Nina Kunzendorf and Friederike Becht). It is an exemplary matter of the economic and ecological responsibility of the developed world as well as nature’s right to integrity. Or, to put it more drastically: the question at hand is whether and how the world community can be held accountable for reliably ensuring the livelihoods of portions of its members.

Senior political and industrial representatives are summoned as witnesses. In the precedent-setting case, the court has to decide whether German policymakers can be held accountable for their failure to protect the climate.

The plaintiffs charge that for decades the Federal Republic of Germany not only violated its obligation under international law to counteract increasing CO₂ emissions, but also undermined and blocked all European climate-protection requirements to the best of its ability. And thus the FRG, embodied by the 80-year-old Angela Merkel (Martina Eitner-Acheampong), is now on trial, answering for its actions from 1990 to 2020. Co-defendant Gerhard Schroeder, however, sends his apologies for being a no-show due to being on a medicinal cure in Russia – a passing detail that offers an indication of the humor, cool rationality and obsession with detail that this interplay of science-fiction and docudrama displays.

The subplots are inferred in easy strokes: during the course of the trial, a nefarious spin doctor falsifies audio files and uses his perfectly constructed fake news to stir up the mood on social media. The former ties between the defense counsel of the Federal Republic (Ulrich Tukur) and one of the plaintiff lawyers are adumbrated en passant. By the same token, a fundamental tactical and generational conflict simmers between the two plaintiff lawyers.

The core aim of Ecocide is a concentrated analysis of the present as viewed through a magnifying glass of the future. Andres Veiel and his co-author Jutta Doberstein unmask how lobby-based political decisions of our present and recent past are robbing the world of its future prospects.