Educational Media Reviews Online

Rare Earth is a documentary about rare earth mineral mining in the Mojave Desert. It’s a subject worthy of discussion as there are many stakeholders that are affected and tied to it in different ways. A strength of the film lies in trying to get at this by presenting different views from locals, miners, and industry. People who see mining as disrupting the ecosystem and ruining the landscape; people who simply want to make money to support themselves and their family; and industry who want to produce electronics to keep up with consumer demands. These views would make for great classroom discussion.

Unfortunately, the film is hard to follow as there are very lengthy pauses between speech while footage of the landscape or mining operations are shown, which rather disrupts the flow of thought. The audio and visual generally feels disjointed; the visuals seem to just be there for dramatic effect and frequently don’t correlate with the interviews. It’s often difficult to determine who is speaking; several people are interviewed but aren’t introduced first. It’s eventually revealed who the person is but having on screen names would have been beneficial. A narrator would also have alleviated this issue and could have perhaps filled in the long quiet gaps. Alternatively, the film could have been much shorter if the long pauses were condensed; it’s nearly an hour long, so lengthy for a classroom showing, especially if planning a discussion on the same day. Previous class instruction on what rare earth minerals are, would be suggested as it’s only briefly discussed in this film. Bear in mind, the film is also from 2014, so a bit dated at this point. No captions available on the streaming version that was viewed for this review, so can’t comment on their quality.

Not recommended for teaching about rare earth minerals themselves or their use, but more for environmental studies, effects of the mining industry, or instruction focusing on the Mojave Desert in particular.

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