The Great Invisible
A compelling and disturbing documentary about the US’s worst off-shore oil disaster.
- Director Margaret Brown
- Producer Julie Goldman, Jason Orans, Margaret Brown
- USA 2014
- 92 mins
- Production company Participant Media
Margaret Brown’s revealing and absorbing documentary charts the aftermath of the 2010 explosion on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig, operated on behalf of energy giant BP, in the Gulf of Mexico. The incident left 11 workers dead and the vast oil spill that leaked from the rig’s stricken underwater pipes decimated the local fishing and related industries. With probing sympathy and sharp-eyed insight, Brown stays with the communities most affected by the disaster and uncovers stories of people for whom BP’s much-reported pay-out was scant compensation for their loss of livelihood. A forensically compelling account of what happened, the film also asks nagging, wider questions about the oil industry’s safety record in an era of escalating profits and, most provocatively of all, our own dependence on cheap fossil fuel.
Edward Lawrenson
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