内容摘要：The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s

The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s

That and the giant drone, its wingspan similar to that of an eagle, chuffing high above as it rains organic fertilizer onto the knee-high rice seedlings billowing below.Using less water and using a drone to fertilize are new techniques that Van is trying and

hopes will help solve a paradox at the heart of growing rice: The finicky crop isn’t just vulnerable to climate change but also contributes uniquely to it.Rice must be grown separately from other crops and seedlings have to be individually planted in flooded fields; backbreaking, dirty work requiring a lot of labor and water that generates a lot of methane,that can trap more than 80-times more heat in the atmosphere in the short term than carbon dioxide.

A worker surveys Vo Van Van’s rice fields after spraying fertilizer over the fields using a drone in Long An province in southern Vietnam’s Mekong Delta, Tuesday, Jan. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)A worker surveys Vo Van Van’s rice fields after spraying fertilizer over the fields using a drone in Long An province in southern Vietnam’s Mekong Delta, Tuesday, Jan. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

It’s a problem unique to growing rice, as inundated fields stop oxygen from entering the soil, creating the conditions for methane-producing bacteria. Rice paddies contribute 8% of all human-made methane in the atmosphere,

Vietnam is the world’s third-largest rice exporter, and the staple importance to Vietnamese culture is palpable in the Mekong Delta. The fertile patchwork of green fields crisscrossed by silvery waterways has helped stave off famine since the Vietnam War ended in 1975. Rice isn’t just theBut after this rush of cavalier soldiering and bitter sarcasm comes a sobering moment. Merit blinks her eyes and is instead staring at an empty chair. Zoe isn’t there at all.

“My Dead Friend Zoe,” co-starringand Ed Harris, confronts a dark reality of post-combat struggle with as much humor and playfulness as it does trauma and sorrow. It comes from a real place, and you can tell. Hausmann-Stoke is himself a veteran and “My Dead Friend Zoe” is dedicated to a pair of his platoon mates who killed themselves. The opening titles note the film was “inspired by a true story.”

Audience disinterest has characterized many, though not all, of the films about theand the output has pretty much dried up over the years. “My Dead Friend Zoe” feels like it was made with an awareness of that trend and as a rebuke to it.