Originally published on metropolis.co.jp on August 2012

Ian Cheney entertained, educated and frightened me with King Corn, an excellent doc he co-produced about the corn agribusiness. His next target is the way city lights are obscuring the stars for most of us. (I don’t know what he’s talking about; in Tokyo you can see half a dozen on a clear night.) Light pollution also disorients sea turtles and migratory birds, and studies show that working the aptly named graveyard shift can cause circadian-rhythm-related health problems. It’s nicely presented, but let’s be honest, among the myriad things threatening our environment, this doesn’t even make the top ten.