Concern about the environment is big news these days, with the Green Party stepping up as a contender in the federal election sweepstakes, though the Vancouver International Film Festival was ahead of the game last year with its new program, Climate for Change.

That program is gone this year, but taking its place at VIFF 2008 is The Ark: Elements and Animals. Why the change?

‘We’ll probably rename our environmental program every year,’ says festival executive director Alan Franey. ‘I think fatigue would rapidly set in if people just went to see films that told them how horrible the state of the planet is in and that we ought to lead better lives.’

He says the fest, which gets underway next Thursday, has to ‘find films that really surprise you and have that element of innovation and discovery. Even if we’re responding to fairly standard environmental themes, we can’t program in a preachy way.’

While Climate for Change concentrated on peak oil and global warming, The Ark has new themes: water and humanity’s relationship to animals. A key world premiere will be the Canada/U.S. coproduction Blue Gold: World Water Wars, directed by Sam Bozzo and based on the book by activist Maude Barlow and Tony Clarke.

‘The film has sharpness and density of information,’ says Franey. ‘It has the authority to blame wrong-doers. It’s a good work of agit-prop.’

Another Canadian film that made it into The Ark is Addicted to Plastic! by Ian Connacher — a stylish, occasionally funny but ultimately angry look at what plastic does to the environment around the world.

‘My jaw dropped at some of the images that I ended up seeing. That big pool of plastic in the Pacific Ocean! Extremely impressive,’ comments VIFF programmer Terry McEvoy.

Reaching beyond Canada, The Ark features films from The Netherlands (The Lost Colony), Wales (Sleep Furiously) and the U.S. (Cat Dancers). One international film that sparks enthusiasm in Franey is Brit Molly Dineen’s The Lie of the Land.

‘She set out to make a film about fox hunting and it turned into something else — how the land and the people in it have been transformed recently,’ he says.

Speaking of Dineen, Barlow and the rest, Franey reflects: ‘I think a lot of these films ask really hard ethical questions. They’re not about how you should spend your grocery money. These films are about how we can lead meaningful lives — not just sustainable ones — right now and in the future.’