I had heard of Edward Abbey’s infamous novel, ‘The Monkey Wrench Gang’ (1975), but I was unfamiliar with the man himself. Watching Wrenched, and listening to Abbey speak, I felt that there was no better way to summarise the core of his activism than in his own statement: “A bulldozer tearing up the hill-side is committing a kind of terrorism against life”. Underneath it all lies the terrifying vision of machines tearing and devouring the natural world and all living things that inhabit it. ML Lincoln’s documentary, Wrenched, concerns itself with Abbey and his legacy, of the groups and ideals that grew out of his fertile beliefs, and it will make you angry, hopefully in a good way.
