From the producers of Chasing Ice, The Cove, and Racing Extinction, The Human Element highlights fishermen, firefighters, coal miners and children on the frontlines of climate change.  

From the producers of Chasing Ice, The Cove, and Racing Extinction, The Human Element travels with internationally renowned photographer James Balog on his stunning visual odyssey which documents how climate change is impacting the air, earth, fire and water that shapes life on earth.

With rare compassion and heart, The Human Element highlights the individuals who are on the frontlines of climate change, inspiring us to re-evaluate our relationship with the natural world.

During his four-decade career as a photographer and explorer, James Balog has focused his lens on the complex relationship  between humans and nature.

Now a major voice in the climate change conversation, and operating at the height of his career, Balog is witnessing the most sweeping and rapid environmental change in the history of the planet.

Balog visits Tangier Island, a fishing community in the Chesapeake Bay who are facing the imminent reality of sea level rise threatening their island’s future. We meet Yadira Sanchez and her three children in Denver, Colorado, all of whom suffer from asthma, and attend a special school on a hospital campus for children struggling with air.

Balog embeds with a Fire Strike team on the frontlines of the most expensive wildfire in California history to witness how human activity is changing how wildfires behave on the landscape. And he ventures deep into Kentucky coal country, meeting unemployed miners finding hope from a new source.

The film promises to reach outside the environmentalist bubble to a new audience by appealing on a relatable, emotional, personal level.

The film shows us how humanity is tantamount to a fifth element that affects and modulates the others. Knowing this, Balog finds great hope that the fifth element, the human element, can bring the whole system back into balance.

CLASSIFICATION: Restricted to persons aged 15 and over unless accompanied by an adult