Film Review: ‘Greater than Greta’
I am Greta, as the title suggests, is as much a story about a teenager trying to make sense of the world and find purpose as it is about the issue of climate change. The film begins and almost ends with Greta on a boat, sailing across the Atlantic, an apt metaphor for her real life long and arduous voyage, with no shores nearby.
In 2018 August, Greta, a 15-year-old girl, began the School Strike for the Climate in front of the Sweden Parliament. She was alone, but not for long. The film tells an important story of Greta Thunberg, a climate change activist and where it all began, but does little to go deeper into the issue she duly cares about.
It is Nathan Grossman’s first documentary film as a director and when he started following Greta in 2015 with his camera (with consent, of course), he had no Idea that Greta would become synonymous with the Issue she is fighting for. Most of us were introduced to Greta by her UN speech of 2019 in New York. She appeared angry, frustrated and unabashedly honest. This film tells us what you saw was a build up to a simmering frustration in response to the inaction of the world leaders in spite of multiple speeches and demands.
Greta watched a documentary in School where Scientists said that we don’t have enough time to act. This stuck with her, and she couldn’t not care. She changed her way of living to make it more sustainable and environment friendly. She stopped eating meat and dairy, stopped buying clothes and even stopped flying, a testimony that we would see later in the film. Her family, that earlier lived a high consumption life, followed.
The film helps us to know Greta better, up close and personal. What goes on in the mind of a 15-year-old girl that can’t stop thinking about climate change, reading about it, educating her and demanding action from the politicians. In the film, Greta reveals that she doesn't like small talk or to socialize. She likes routines and playing with her dog. She notices details and if interested, has laser focus, a result of having Asperger’s syndrome. In her personal world, Greta dances, bakes with her mother and combs his horse’s hair and falls asleep while hugging him.
The film also explores the delicate yet intimate relationship of Greta with her father, Svante Thunberg. Savante accompanies her in her trip to various parts of Europe where she is invited to speak and makes sure that her physical and mental health is not compromised amidst her laser focused fight for climate change. On being asked if he is okay with Greta’s activism, he replies like a father would - ‘I want her to be happy’.
As Greta’s movement gains momentum and attracts mass solidarity, it also attracts the naysayers with their crude and ugly comments. The film shows how these negative comments about her by the world politicians affected her, to the point that she breaks down in one of her UN Speech. It mirrors her helplessness with having to say the same thing over and over again with no resulting actions.
The film uses Greta’s voice over, which Nathan Grossman reveals in one of his Interviews is Greta’s personal thoughts written in a diary. As noble as the film is in its intention to highlight Greta and her endeavours, it heavily relies on cliché tropes of using voice-overs that impede the organic flow of the story. The documentary on several occasions dramatizes the action by using tense crescendo music that looks forced and on your nose.
Greta’s attachment to Nature is also mirrored in her love for animals through her pet dog and a horse. She shares a profound relationship with them that makes her cry when she is away and can’t be around them, a stark contrast to her public persona of being rough and crude.
While the theme of Grossman’s documentary is the issue of climate change and why it is a situation of crisis, the film keeps you yearning for actionable information on the issue, but to no avail. The film does not go deep into the science behind climate change or what are the exact demands of Greta regarding the Leaders of the developed Countries. Greta’s father says that Greta understands the issue better than 97% of the world leaders, and yet the filmmaker did not show us anything that would cement that belief.
The film also explores the idea of celebrity culture and how easily the masses idolize someone to the point that it overpowers what they stand for. Greta makes it repeatedly clear that she does not want any attention, the issue does. She visibly feels uncomfortable when people are trying to take pictures at a climate change rally in Poland. She respects their emotions, but wants them to dismiss her and focus on the issue.
In the climatic scene, Greta decides to sail instead of fly to the US, where she is invited to speak on the matter. It took her 14 days to reach New York from Plymouth, UK, from where she started. It was a difficult decision for her, but she wanted to lead by example. She wanted to show that it is possible to live a sustainable life. It is on this journey that she breaks down while recording an audio diary. She confesses ‘It is too much for me’ and that moment stays with you. You suddenly realize that she is right, it is too much, and she chooses to do it anyway.
In one of the interviews, Greta is asked if she suffers from Asperger’s syndrome to which she replies ‘I don’t suffer from Asperger, I have it’. This line sums up Greta for me. She is Greater than any Greta I knew before.
