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Once Upon a Forest

Name: Once Upon a Forest
Director: Luc Jacquet
Released: 2013
Duration: 78 min

Representation Score

7.5/10

Good

2013

Director

Luc Jacquet

Runtime

78 minutes

Average Rating

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New Showbiz Analysis

Luc Jacquet’s documentary shifts the cinematic lens away from human-centric structures toward a complex, interconnected biological ecosystem. By elevating the ability to act of non-human entities, the film disrupts the expectation that cinema must revolve around human social hierarchies. The work functions as a meditation on ecological balance. It frames the environment as a sovereign entity rather than a resource to be managed, aligning with progressive environmental ethics. While the film does not engage with human identity politics, it performs a significant deconstruction of the 'human-as-center' cliché through its immersive, sensory-driven narrative.

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Category Breakdown

Does Once Upon a Forest have LGBTQ+ representation?

Fair

The film focuses on non-human biological processes rather than human social identities, keeping the LGBTQ category neutral.

How does Once Upon a Forest portray gender?

Fair

Without human protagonists, the film bypasses traditional gender hierarchies. ability to act is distributed among various species, de-centering human masculinity or femininity in favor of biological imperatives.

How racially and ethnically diverse is Once Upon a Forest?

Fair

Operating in a non-human context, the documentary avoids anthropocentric racial hierarchies by presenting species diversity as a functional necessity for ecosystem stability.

How does Once Upon a Forest represent religion and culture?

Good

The narrative challenges anthropocentric worldviews by prioritizing the forest's voice. It frames the natural world as a sophisticated, self-regulating system independent of human morality.

Does Once Upon a Forest include disability representation?

Fair

Biological struggles are depicted through natural selection rather than a social model of disability, avoiding the use of biological struggle as a mere plot device or inspiration porn.

Present on Screen

Deconstructs the human-as-center cliché by elevating non-human ability to act.
Challenges anthropocentric worldviews by prioritizing ecological voices.
Promotes a post-humanist perspective that views nature as a sovereign system.

Limited or Absent

Does not engage with human social identities or identity politics.
Lacks representation of human social constructs like gender or race.

Official Synopsis

With Once Upon a Forest, Luc Jacquet invites the spectator into a never-before-seen world of natural wonder and staggering beauty. “For the first time, we will be able to watch a rain forest growing before our eyes…Only cinema can offer this unique voyage into a completely untamed universe, a world of perfect balance in which each living thing – from the smallest to the largest – plays an essential role. The film will deliver a complete sensory immersion in the primaeval splendor of one of nature’s richest mysteries, inviting the audience to enter, discover and marvel at a universe of untold treasures while joining its voice to the ever-growing awareness of the need to preserve our world.”

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