Ground War (2018)
(On TV, November 2022) All nature is wholesome, right? Right? Having a gold course next door is far better than another skyscraper or a highway, right? Right?? Well, as writer-director Andrew Nisker’s Ground War suggests, maybe it’s not so simple. Maybe the incredible effort to keep carefully manicured greens requires so many dangerous chemicals that it’s not worth it. The driving thread through Nisker’s film is a very personal quest: Why did his father die of Hodgkin’s Lymphoma when he was so healthy, when he spent so much time exercising on gold courses? Nisker’s questions take him deep beyond the façade of “natural” golf courses, in a world where harmful (but not illegal!) pesticides are used by the bucketful, and where industry representatives clam up very quickly when anyone asks questions about carcinogens and the heightened risk of deadly disease. It also takes us into the world of environmental activism—how Canada is slightly (but not much) better than the United States thanks to stricter laws. How some people will deliberately avoid stepping on golf grounds for their knowledge of how many harmful products are used in the pursuit of perfect lawns. Don’t be surprised, after seeing this film, to hope for a rewilding of golf courses, for stricter regulations, and for no longer seeing the neighbourhood school’s athletic field so benignly. This should not be such a new message, nor is Ground War all that finely crafted. And yet, it lingers.