Watch Joaquin Phoenix Try to Save the Planet in New Short Film 'Guardians of Life'

BY Allie GregoryPublished Feb 6, 2020

Continuing his campaign for saviour of the planet, Joaquin Phoenix has appeared in a Shaun Monson-directed film titled Guardians of Life — a two-minute short that "centres on the near-critical stage of the climate crisis the planet is facing."

The film arrives today in part from Extinction Rebellion and Amazon Watch and stars Phoenix alongside Rosario Dawson, Matthew Modine, the Strokes' Albert Hammond Jr., Adria Arjona, Oona Chaplin and Q'orianka Kilcher.

In the film, after ER doctors fail to resuscitate a mystery patient, an Indigenous nurse hops up on to the operating table to revive them. The camera pans away to reveal the patient was planet Earth all along.

"As an Indigenous actress I feel a strong responsibility to use my public platform to help amplify the voices who are seldom heard including all the Indigenous defenders around the world who are the protectors of our Mother Earth, the Amazon Rainforest, and all the biodiversity and animals," Kilcher said of the film in a statement.

Phoenix added, "It's really a call to action. I did it to raise awareness about the meat and dairy industry's effect on climate change. The fact is we are clear-cutting and burning rainforests and seeing the negative effects of those actions worldwide. People don't realize there's still time, but only if we act now and make sweeping changes to our consumption. We can't wait for governments to solve these problems for us. We can't wait until the election to try to make these changes. We have a personal responsibility to make changes in our own lives and act now."

This video is the first in a 12-part series that aims to tell stories about "the most pressing issues facing the human species as we move into what most scientists, politicians and the public see as the make or break decade for the survival of life on the planet."

Extinction Rebellion and Amazon Watch are now accepting donations for their cause here.

Watch Guardians of Life over here.

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