Canberra student and well-known climate activist Daisy Jeffrey features in a new documentary on Amazon Prime, titled Burning, that takes an unflinching look at Australia’s 2019-20 ‘Black Summer’ bushfires.

The 19-year-old first-year ANU arts student activist journey began when she first got involved with the School Strike for Climate movement in late 2018.

Then, in early 2020 at age 17, she authored a book on the politics of climate change titled On Hope.

Jeffrey’s involvement came after Burning director, Eva Orner, personally reached out to her toward the end of last year.

Her involvement in the documentary involved an interview in Sydney before spending “three-to-four” days with the film crew on Gumbaynggir country – the northern NSW highlands – taking in the aftermath of the Black Summer bushfires.

From Sydney originally, Jeffrey said the experience grounded her and gave her perspective of the impact of the bushfires.

“That usual symphony of sound you hear in the bush is just not there anymore and it’s really unusually desolate considering you’re meant to be in the subtropics,” she said.

“As an inner-city person in that situation … it’s unlike someone living in rural/regional Australia who are still living with the ramifications of the bushfire crisis and are already facing growing threats of further crises.”

While on the ground with the film crew Jeffrey took in the severity of the bushfires and saw first-hand just how insidious they were.

“We weren’t just observing the damage, but actually observing the long-term impact of the fires and how it was changing the areas around it,” she said.

She’s ultimately proud of Burning for telling it like it is and avoiding the typical climate doco cliché of ending the film with unbridled optimism.

“You don’t come away with this sort of unrealistic lump of hope just dropped on the end,” Jeffrey said.

“I’ve seen a lot of films about the bushfires and a lot of talk, and I have to be honest, none of them hit the nail on the head as much as this documentary has.

“Often it’s a case of ‘tragedy, tragedy, tragedy, tragedy, oh, but there’s hope’ right at the end.

“This documentary gives you what happened, the personal and the macro aspects of it, and who is responsible for fuelling this crisis, what we can do.”

Jeffrey said Burning does the job of speaking not just to climate scientists, but to people on the ground with that lived experience of fighting fire: “people in those communities whose lives were torn apart”.

“I was just astounded by it, it’s incredible,” she said, “but it will make you cry.”

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