The most soothing call to arms of the year is the documentary “Call of the Forest: The Forgotten Wisdom of Trees.” Diane Beresford-Kroeger, as soothing a promoter as you’re ever going to meet has a simple plan: “If every person plants one tree each year for six years, a native species tree in a native space, we can reverse global climate change.
Beresford-Kroeger’s tone of voice resonates even more when she stands amidst trees that seem to know she’s a kindred spirit. Outing herself as Irish, she points to a redwood tree and suggests it’s “haunted by silence and a certain quality of mercy.”
In Japan, Diane describes how “forest bathing” attracts everyone from school children to businessmen. They come to get refreshed and invigorated, and not merely “to soften the concrete experience.” Beresford-Kroeger refers to medicinal aerosols that provide direct benefits to the immune system. She says people just feel better when they smell rich soil in a natural forest, “the most complex chemistry on the planet.”
Beresford-Kroeger, a botanist and medical biochemist, writes books such as “The Global Forest” (the inspiration for this film). On her farm, she’s spent 40 years preserving and protecting rare North American tree species, helping them to survive climate change.
See “Call of the Forest.” Yes, you will consume more than a whiff of gloom and doom. Mostly, though, you will bathe in the encouraging wisdom and devotion of Diane Beresford-Kroeger and her lifelong passion for trees.