Produced and directed by Peter Davis and Harvey McKinnon, The Nature of David Suzuki is a documentary created for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's biographical series, Life and Times. The first broadcast was in January 1998. This short film (44 minutes) is a biographical treatment of environmentalist David Suzuki that highlights significant events in his life, particularly his childhood years in a Japanese-Canadian internment camp. Suzuki reflects on his life and work, and the film includes appearances of family members, school friends, colleagues, and adversaries about his environmental work. In addition, the film contains interviews interspersed with still photographs and footage of Suzuki driving through childhood neighbourhoods and includes Suzuki's self-critical reflection on his life and work.
Peter Davis is a British-Canadian documentary film director with more than thirty titles to his credit, several of his films deal with African nations during the liberation and independence years, including South Africa: The White Laagger, Remember Nelson Mandela!, Winnie Mandela: The Apartheid Years and Side by Side: Women against AIDS in Zimbabwe. In addition, he directed the 1967 short film Anatomy of Violence, which reports on a London (UK) symposium on Liberation and Violence and includes American left-wing activists Paul Goodman, Stokely Carmichael, Malcolm X and Herbert Marcuse.
Harvey McKinnon is an inspirational speaker and trainer and has raised significant funds for various non-profit organizations. He has worked as a radio columnist for CBC Radio and has been published in numerous Canadian newspapers. In addition, McKinnon has produced or written several award-winning documentaries, including Side by Side: Women Against Aids, At Home in the Universe: The Life and Times of William Shatner, and The Black Sea in Crisis.