In his 2002 documentary Bowling for Columbine, film-maker Michael Moore created a montage of US political atrocities and CIA-endorsed disasters – the Vietnam war, the Chilean coup, training Osama bin Laden and so on – all set with (rather heavy-handed) irony to Louis Armstrong’s heavenly ‘What a Wonderful World’.

In 2021, food sharing app Olio has assembled an army of adorable moppets to sing the song, and situated them in a gigantic landfill site. Close-ups of clasped hands, binned toys and floating plastic bags hit hard – as does the final shot, in which the kids look like they might be swallowed up by the mountains of waste.

It’s more powerful than in Moore’s film, thanks in part to the tasteful, slightly creepy arrangement of the song. The bold ‘Share more. Waste less’ slogan, meanwhile, invites viewers to do their own research into Olio – or simply do whatever else they can to battle the crisis.

Topics