No Pressure (film)
Encyclopedia
No Pressure is a controversial 2010 short film produced by the global warming mitigation campaign 10:10
, written by Richard Curtis
and Franny Armstrong
, and directed by Dougal Wilson
. Intended for cinema and television advertisements, No Pressure is composed of scenes in which a variety of people in every-day situations are graphically blown to pieces for failing to be sufficiently enthusiastic about the 10:10 campaign to reduce CO2
emissions. The film's makers said that they viewed No Pressure as "a funny and satirical tongue-in-cheek little film in the over-the-top style of Monty Python or South Park". Before its release, The Guardian described it as "attention-grabbing" and "pretty edgy."
The film was withdrawn from public circulation by 10:10, on the same day it was released, due to negative publicity. Charities that had backed the film stated they were "absolutely appalled" upon seeing it, and several of 10:10's corporate and strategic partners withdrew from partnership. Fox News called the film "a blood-splattering display that has drawn anger from critics and sheepish embarrassment from its supporters."
The film was shot on a location at Camden School for Girls
, in the London Borough of Camden in North London. According to 10:10, over 50 film professionals and more than 40 actors and extras provided their services at no cost.
In the first scene, a bright and chirpy schoolteacher tells her class about the 10:10 campaign, and asks what they are doing to reduce their carbon footprint
. She asks which students are planning to participate; most raise their hands, but two children do not. The teacher reassures them that this is "fine, it's absolutely fine, it's your choice" and there is "no pressure", but then shifts the papers on her desk to reveal a red-buttoned detonator, which she presses. The two children who did not want to participate explode, covering their screaming classmates with blood and body parts. The blood-spattered teacher then goes on casually to explain the night's homework to her horrified charges.
The second scene shows a group of white-collar workers in an office meeting. The office manager similarly explains the purpose of the 10:10 campaign, and asks who will be participating. Again, most raise their hands, but four do not. The manager reassures them that there is "no pressure" to participate, but he is then handed a detonator by an assistant, which he uses to blow up the four workers, splattering appalled co-workers with gore.
The third scene is set on a football pitch during team training. The coach, played by David Ginola
, asks the players to explain the 10:10 campaign that the team is participating in. They describe a range of energy-saving measures which have been implemented by the team and its fans. However, the coach is uninterested, remarking that he would rather just concentrate on football. A player tells him that there's "no pressure", produces a detonator and blows him up. Unlike the witnesses depicted in previous scenes, the team is not at all surprised, and casually jogs away to resume training.
A brief interlude with captions explains the campaign, accompanied by music from Radiohead
. In the final scene, the actress Gillian Anderson
is finishing the voice-over for the interlude just seen. The sound engineer asks her what she is planning to do to cut her carbon footprint
. Anderson explains that she thought providing the recording was a sufficient contribution. The sound engineer repeats the film's catchphrase, "no pressure", and detonates Anderson. The film ends with a shot of blood and gore sliding down the sound-booth window with the text "Cut your carbon by 10%. No pressure."
In The Daily Telegraph
, James Delingpole
wrote that the film was an "ugly, counterproductive eco-propaganda movie" and that "with No Pressure, the environmental movement has revealed the snarling, wicked, homicidal misanthropy beneath its cloak of gentle, bunny-hugging righteousness". The ConservativeHome
website described it as "crass, tasteless and unfunny as it gets", while Melanie Phillips
in The Spectator
commented on the intended humorous aspect of the film by writing that "The joke was only about blowing dissenters to bits and raining their flesh down on terrified people. Because exterminating human beings is acceptable to greens as a joke. From which we can only assume at best indifference towards and at worst a profound loathing of the human condition".
American environmentalist
and writer Bill McKibben
lamented the film on the Climate Progress website, where he wrote "The climate skeptics can crow. It's the kind of stupidity that hurts our side, reinforcing in people's minds a series of preconceived notions, not the least of which is that we're out-of-control and out of touch—not to mention off the wall, and also with completely misplaced sense of humor". McKibben added "There's no question that crap like this will cast a shadow, for a time, over our efforts and everyone else who's working on global warming. McKibben subsequently withdrew as an organisational partner of 10:10. When The Daily Caller
asked about the film, environmental organisation Greenpeace
spokeswoman Jane Kochersperger stated that "as an organisation committed to non-violence, I think you can imagine how Greenpeace views this material. At this time, the only people promoting the material are climate skeptics and think tanks funded by corporations known for lobbying against climate change legislation". Five other environmental groups contacted by The Daily Caller did not comment on the film.
In The Independent
, Dominic Lawson
wrote "As often as 10:10 tried to pull the film off YouTube, their critics re-posted it. This, at least, proves what a cataclysmic misjudgement Curtis had made. When you try to satirise the critics of your campaign, and it turns out that those very critics embrace your film as demonstrating exactly what they find unbearable about the climate-obsessed eco-lobby, then you know that you have kicked the ball into your own net".
The film generated a huge reaction in the blogosphere
. One comment to The Guardian read: "To suggest that people who disagree with you deserve to die is incredibly stupid. Imagine if some Christian group in the US did that to gays, Muslims or anyone else they disagree with. The outrage would be palpable. And deserved."
The Guardian, which was a key collaborator with the 10:10 campaign since its launch and got exclusive rights to show the film première, responded to the criticism by stating that "the film may have been somewhat tasteless, but it was an imaginative attempt to challenge public apathy over climate change". This statement originally ended "and, highly unusually for attempts to communicate about this subject, funny too", but this was later redacted. A later report in the newspaper by Adam Vaughan said that the film, "intended as a tongue-in-cheek spoof of hectoring greens", had created a huge amount of global coverage for 10:10, in print and on the web. The report said that while many people had found the film hilarious, there was a "predictable slating from climate sceptics" as well as furious reactions from some environmentalists. The report also went on to describe other, more reflective responses, which had focused on effective communication, psychology, satire, and ways of engaging with various audiences over climate change.
by Michelle Malkin in the Litchfield County Register and Andrew Revkin in an opinion piece in the New York Times. A spokesman for 10:10 also denied that the withdrawal had been planned from the beginning in order to generate publicity. After removing the video from YouTube, 10:10 issued a statement: "We won't be making any attempt to censor or remove other versions currently in circulation on the internet". Then, on Monday 5 October 10:10 director Eugenie Harvey issued a second, more comprehensive apology, stating: "We are... sorry to our corporate sponsors, delivery partners and board members, who have been implicated in this situation despite having no involvement in the film's production or release."
ActionAid, a charity which co-ordinates a schools programme with 10:10, approved the decision to withdraw the film, and stated "Our job is to encourage proactive decisions at class level to reduce carbon emissions. We did it because evidence shows children are deeply concerned about climate change and because we see the impacts of it in the developing world where a lot of our work is. So we think the 10:10 campaign is very important, but the moment this film was seen it was clear it was inappropriate."
In the wake of the film's withdrawal, Richard Curtis admitted that the attempt to draw attention to the cause of lowering emissions may have backfired. Curtis said "When you try to be funny on a serious subject, it's obviously risky. I hope people who don't like the little film will still think about the big issue and try to do something about it."
Europe's Director of Communications, issued a statement saying, "we strongly condemn the No Pressure video which was conceived, produced and released by 10:10 entirely without the knowledge or involvement of Sony", and cutting ties with 10:10: "As a result we have taken the decision to disassociate ourselves from 10:10 at this time". Kyocera
and Eaga
were removed from the list of 10:10 sponsors, and National Magazine Company
was removed from the list of 10:10 media partners. At the same time, a spokesman for O2
, a partner of 10:10, refused to disassociate itself from the group: "10:10 is an independent organisation and we don't ask for editorial control over the content of its campaigns."
350.org
, with whom 10:10 had been collaborating on the 10 October 2010 day of action, broke all current and future relations with 10:10. In a press release, they said: "We respect 10:10's previous work to encourage companies, schools, and churches to voluntarily cut their carbon emissions 10%. Upon seeing the video, however, we have informed 10:10 that we can no longer remain partners on 10 October 2010 or any other initiative. 350.org maintains an absolute commitment to nonviolence in word and deed".
10:10
Drono Acharya composed the film's songs and Ritam Sen, Sandip Chakrabarty, Padmanabha Dasgupta, Rana Basu Thakur and Rangeet wrote the lyrics.-External links:* IMDB Title* * *...
, written by Richard Curtis
Richard Curtis
Richard Whalley Anthony Curtis, CBE is a New Zealand-born British screenwriter, music producer, actor and film director, known primarily for romantic comedy films such as Four Weddings and a Funeral, Bridget Jones's Diary, Notting Hill, Love Actually and The Girl in the Café, as well as the hit...
and Franny Armstrong
Franny Armstrong
Franny Armstrong is a British documentary film director working for her own company, Spanner Films, and a former drummer with indie pop group The Band of Holy Joy...
, and directed by Dougal Wilson
Dougal Wilson
Dougal Wilson is a director of commercials and music videos.Wilson was born in Heswall, England. After studying astrophysics at Durham University, he worked as a copywriter at the Leith advertising agency in Edinburgh before moving to London to pursue a career as a director.His music videos...
. Intended for cinema and television advertisements, No Pressure is composed of scenes in which a variety of people in every-day situations are graphically blown to pieces for failing to be sufficiently enthusiastic about the 10:10 campaign to reduce CO2
Carbon dioxide
Carbon dioxide is a naturally occurring chemical compound composed of two oxygen atoms covalently bonded to a single carbon atom...
emissions. The film's makers said that they viewed No Pressure as "a funny and satirical tongue-in-cheek little film in the over-the-top style of Monty Python or South Park". Before its release, The Guardian described it as "attention-grabbing" and "pretty edgy."
The film was withdrawn from public circulation by 10:10, on the same day it was released, due to negative publicity. Charities that had backed the film stated they were "absolutely appalled" upon seeing it, and several of 10:10's corporate and strategic partners withdrew from partnership. Fox News called the film "a blood-splattering display that has drawn anger from critics and sheepish embarrassment from its supporters."
Background and production
The film was made in an attempt to challenge the "no pressure" attitude often displayed both by governments and individuals towards taking real action on climate change. 10:10 highlighted the urgency of action with claims that carbon dioxide emissions must be stabilised by 2014 (within four years) in order to avoid disaster, and that "300,000 real people" are already killed by climate change annually. Lizzie Gillet, 10:10 global campaign director, explained: "With climate change becoming increasingly threatening, and decreasingly talked about in the media, we wanted to find a way to bring this critical issue back into the headlines while making people laugh. We were therefore delighted when Richard Curtis agreed to write a short film for the 10:10 campaign".The film was shot on a location at Camden School for Girls
Camden School for Girls
The Camden School for Girls is a comprehensive secondary school for girls, with a co-educational sixth form, in the London Borough of Camden in North London. It has about one thousand students of ages eleven to eighteen, and specialist-school status as a Music College...
, in the London Borough of Camden in North London. According to 10:10, over 50 film professionals and more than 40 actors and extras provided their services at no cost.
Synopsis
The four-minute film consists of a series of short scenes in which groups of people are asked if they are interested in participating in the 10:10 project to reduce carbon emissions. Those failing to show enthusiasm for the cause are gruesomely blown to pieces.In the first scene, a bright and chirpy schoolteacher tells her class about the 10:10 campaign, and asks what they are doing to reduce their carbon footprint
Carbon footprint
A carbon footprint has historically been defined as "the total set of greenhouse gas emissions caused by an organization, event, product or person.". However, calculating a carbon footprint which conforms to this definition is often impracticable due to the large amount of data required, which is...
. She asks which students are planning to participate; most raise their hands, but two children do not. The teacher reassures them that this is "fine, it's absolutely fine, it's your choice" and there is "no pressure", but then shifts the papers on her desk to reveal a red-buttoned detonator, which she presses. The two children who did not want to participate explode, covering their screaming classmates with blood and body parts. The blood-spattered teacher then goes on casually to explain the night's homework to her horrified charges.
The second scene shows a group of white-collar workers in an office meeting. The office manager similarly explains the purpose of the 10:10 campaign, and asks who will be participating. Again, most raise their hands, but four do not. The manager reassures them that there is "no pressure" to participate, but he is then handed a detonator by an assistant, which he uses to blow up the four workers, splattering appalled co-workers with gore.
The third scene is set on a football pitch during team training. The coach, played by David Ginola
David Ginola
David Karl Ginola is a French former international football player who has also worked as an actor and model.Ginola was born in Gassin, Var...
, asks the players to explain the 10:10 campaign that the team is participating in. They describe a range of energy-saving measures which have been implemented by the team and its fans. However, the coach is uninterested, remarking that he would rather just concentrate on football. A player tells him that there's "no pressure", produces a detonator and blows him up. Unlike the witnesses depicted in previous scenes, the team is not at all surprised, and casually jogs away to resume training.
A brief interlude with captions explains the campaign, accompanied by music from Radiohead
Radiohead
Radiohead are an English rock band from Abingdon, Oxfordshire, formed in 1985. The band consists of Thom Yorke , Jonny Greenwood , Ed O'Brien , Colin Greenwood and Phil Selway .Radiohead released their debut single "Creep" in 1992...
. In the final scene, the actress Gillian Anderson
Gillian Anderson
Gillian Leigh Anderson is an American actress.After beginning her career in theatre, Anderson achieved international recognition for her role as Special Agent Dana Scully on the American television series The X-Files. During the show's nine seasons, Anderson won Emmy, Golden Globe, and Screen...
is finishing the voice-over for the interlude just seen. The sound engineer asks her what she is planning to do to cut her carbon footprint
Carbon footprint
A carbon footprint has historically been defined as "the total set of greenhouse gas emissions caused by an organization, event, product or person.". However, calculating a carbon footprint which conforms to this definition is often impracticable due to the large amount of data required, which is...
. Anderson explains that she thought providing the recording was a sufficient contribution. The sound engineer repeats the film's catchphrase, "no pressure", and detonates Anderson. The film ends with a shot of blood and gore sliding down the sound-booth window with the text "Cut your carbon by 10%. No pressure."
Reception
Upon its release, No Pressure provoked an immediate negative reaction in the media, and the resulting controversy became widely referred to as "splattergate" by bloggers.In The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...
, James Delingpole
James Delingpole
James Delingpole is an English columnist and novelist. A self-described libertarian conservative, he writes for The Times, The Daily Telegraph, and The Spectator. He has published several novels and four political books, most recently Watermelons: The Green Movement's True Colors [2011]...
wrote that the film was an "ugly, counterproductive eco-propaganda movie" and that "with No Pressure, the environmental movement has revealed the snarling, wicked, homicidal misanthropy beneath its cloak of gentle, bunny-hugging righteousness". The ConservativeHome
ConservativeHome
Conservative Home is a British political website started by Tim Montgomerie prior to the 2005 United Kingdom general election campaign, that aims to represent UK grassroots Conservative opinion.-Editors:...
website described it as "crass, tasteless and unfunny as it gets", while Melanie Phillips
Melanie Phillips
Melanie Phillips is a British journalist and author. She began her career on the left of the political spectrum, writing for such publications as The Guardian and New Statesman. In the 1990s she moved to the right, and she now writes for the Daily Mail newspaper, covering political and social...
in The Spectator
The Spectator
The Spectator is a weekly British magazine first published on 6 July 1828. It is currently owned by David and Frederick Barclay, who also owns The Daily Telegraph. Its principal subject areas are politics and culture...
commented on the intended humorous aspect of the film by writing that "The joke was only about blowing dissenters to bits and raining their flesh down on terrified people. Because exterminating human beings is acceptable to greens as a joke. From which we can only assume at best indifference towards and at worst a profound loathing of the human condition".
American environmentalist
Environmentalist
An environmentalist broadly supports the goals of the environmental movement, "a political and ethical movement that seeks to improve and protect the quality of the natural environment through changes to environmentally harmful human activities"...
and writer Bill McKibben
Bill McKibben
William Ernest "Bill" McKibben is an American environmentalist, author, and journalist who has written extensively on the impact of global warming. He is the Schumann Distinguished Scholar at Middlebury College...
lamented the film on the Climate Progress website, where he wrote "The climate skeptics can crow. It's the kind of stupidity that hurts our side, reinforcing in people's minds a series of preconceived notions, not the least of which is that we're out-of-control and out of touch—not to mention off the wall, and also with completely misplaced sense of humor". McKibben added "There's no question that crap like this will cast a shadow, for a time, over our efforts and everyone else who's working on global warming. McKibben subsequently withdrew as an organisational partner of 10:10. When The Daily Caller
The Daily Caller
The Daily Caller is a news website based in Washington, D.C., United States, with a focus on politics, original reporting and breaking news, founded by journalist and political pundit Tucker Carlson and Neil Patel, former adviser to former Vice President Dick Cheney...
asked about the film, environmental organisation Greenpeace
Greenpeace
Greenpeace is a non-governmental environmental organization with offices in over forty countries and with an international coordinating body in Amsterdam, The Netherlands...
spokeswoman Jane Kochersperger stated that "as an organisation committed to non-violence, I think you can imagine how Greenpeace views this material. At this time, the only people promoting the material are climate skeptics and think tanks funded by corporations known for lobbying against climate change legislation". Five other environmental groups contacted by The Daily Caller did not comment on the film.
In The Independent
The Independent
The Independent is a British national morning newspaper published in London by Independent Print Limited, owned by Alexander Lebedev since 2010. It is nicknamed the Indy, while the Sunday edition, The Independent on Sunday, is the Sindy. Launched in 1986, it is one of the youngest UK national daily...
, Dominic Lawson
Dominic Lawson
Dominic Ralph Campden Lawson is a British journalist.-Background:Educated at Westminster School and then Christ Church, Oxford, he is the elder son of a former Conservative Chancellor of the Exchequer Lord Lawson and socialite Vanessa Salmon, heir to the Lyons Corner House empire, who died of...
wrote "As often as 10:10 tried to pull the film off YouTube, their critics re-posted it. This, at least, proves what a cataclysmic misjudgement Curtis had made. When you try to satirise the critics of your campaign, and it turns out that those very critics embrace your film as demonstrating exactly what they find unbearable about the climate-obsessed eco-lobby, then you know that you have kicked the ball into your own net".
The film generated a huge reaction in the blogosphere
Blogosphere
The blogosphere is made up of all blogs and their interconnections. The term implies that blogs exist together as a connected community or as a social network in which everyday authors can publish their opinions...
. One comment to The Guardian read: "To suggest that people who disagree with you deserve to die is incredibly stupid. Imagine if some Christian group in the US did that to gays, Muslims or anyone else they disagree with. The outrage would be palpable. And deserved."
The Guardian, which was a key collaborator with the 10:10 campaign since its launch and got exclusive rights to show the film première, responded to the criticism by stating that "the film may have been somewhat tasteless, but it was an imaginative attempt to challenge public apathy over climate change". This statement originally ended "and, highly unusually for attempts to communicate about this subject, funny too", but this was later redacted. A later report in the newspaper by Adam Vaughan said that the film, "intended as a tongue-in-cheek spoof of hectoring greens", had created a huge amount of global coverage for 10:10, in print and on the web. The report said that while many people had found the film hilarious, there was a "predictable slating from climate sceptics" as well as furious reactions from some environmentalists. The report also went on to describe other, more reflective responses, which had focused on effective communication, psychology, satire, and ways of engaging with various audiences over climate change.
Withdrawal
Although originally planned to be shown in cinema and television advertisements, 10:10 removed the film from their website and YouTube later on 1 October 2010. On Friday 2 October, 10:10 placed a notice on their website saying, "Many people found the resulting film extremely funny, but unfortunately some didn't and we sincerely apologise to anybody we have offended. [...] At 10:10 we're all about trying new and creative ways of getting people to take action on climate change. Unfortunately in this instance we missed the mark. Oh well, we live and learn." This was criticised as a non-apology apologyNon-apology apology
A non-apology apology is a statement in the form of an apology but that is not in fact an apology at all. It is common in both politics and public relations...
by Michelle Malkin in the Litchfield County Register and Andrew Revkin in an opinion piece in the New York Times. A spokesman for 10:10 also denied that the withdrawal had been planned from the beginning in order to generate publicity. After removing the video from YouTube, 10:10 issued a statement: "We won't be making any attempt to censor or remove other versions currently in circulation on the internet". Then, on Monday 5 October 10:10 director Eugenie Harvey issued a second, more comprehensive apology, stating: "We are... sorry to our corporate sponsors, delivery partners and board members, who have been implicated in this situation despite having no involvement in the film's production or release."
ActionAid, a charity which co-ordinates a schools programme with 10:10, approved the decision to withdraw the film, and stated "Our job is to encourage proactive decisions at class level to reduce carbon emissions. We did it because evidence shows children are deeply concerned about climate change and because we see the impacts of it in the developing world where a lot of our work is. So we think the 10:10 campaign is very important, but the moment this film was seen it was clear it was inappropriate."
In the wake of the film's withdrawal, Richard Curtis admitted that the attempt to draw attention to the cause of lowering emissions may have backfired. Curtis said "When you try to be funny on a serious subject, it's obviously risky. I hope people who don't like the little film will still think about the big issue and try to do something about it."
Withdrawal of sponsors
Several sponsors withdrew their support of 10:10 as a result of the No Pressure film. Nick Sharples, SonySony
, commonly referred to as Sony, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan and the world's fifth largest media conglomerate measured by revenues....
Europe's Director of Communications, issued a statement saying, "we strongly condemn the No Pressure video which was conceived, produced and released by 10:10 entirely without the knowledge or involvement of Sony", and cutting ties with 10:10: "As a result we have taken the decision to disassociate ourselves from 10:10 at this time". Kyocera
Kyocera
is a multinational manufacturer based in Kyoto, Japan. It was founded as in 1959 by Kazuo Inamori and renamed in 1982. The company has diversified its founding technology in ceramic materials through internal development as well as strategic mergers and acquisitions...
and Eaga
Eaga
Eaga plc was a British company supplying energy efficiency products. It was headquartered in Newcastle upon Tyne. In April 2011 it was acquired by Carillion.- History :...
were removed from the list of 10:10 sponsors, and National Magazine Company
Nat Mags
Nat Mags was a British magazine publisher based in London. It was established in 1910 by William Randolph Hearst and was a wholly owned subsidiary of the Hearst Corporation....
was removed from the list of 10:10 media partners. At the same time, a spokesman for O2
O2 (United Kingdom)
Telefónica UK Limited is a telecommunications, internet and financial services provider in the United Kingdom owned by Telefónica, forming part of its Telefónica Europe division...
, a partner of 10:10, refused to disassociate itself from the group: "10:10 is an independent organisation and we don't ask for editorial control over the content of its campaigns."
350.org
350.org
350.org is an international environmental organization, headed by author Bill McKibben, with the goal of building a global grassroots movement to raise awareness of anthropogenic climate change, to confront climate change denial, and to cut emissions of one of the greenhouse gases, carbon dioxide,...
, with whom 10:10 had been collaborating on the 10 October 2010 day of action, broke all current and future relations with 10:10. In a press release, they said: "We respect 10:10's previous work to encourage companies, schools, and churches to voluntarily cut their carbon emissions 10%. Upon seeing the video, however, we have informed 10:10 that we can no longer remain partners on 10 October 2010 or any other initiative. 350.org maintains an absolute commitment to nonviolence in word and deed".
See also
- Individual and political action on climate changeIndividual and political action on climate changeIndividual and political action on climate change can take many forms, most of which have the ultimate goal of limiting and/or reducing the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, toward avoiding dangerous climate change.-Political action:...
- Climate change mitigation
- Graphic violenceGraphic violenceGraphic violence is the depiction of especially vivid, brutal and realistic acts of violence in visual media such as literature, film, television, and video games...
External links
- http://www.1010global.org/no-pressure Announcement on the 10:10 website on the film's withdrawal.