The methods by which environmental issues are aestheticized in late-twentieth-century film is directly and historically related to those established for grand manner painters by Nicholas Poussin (1594-1665) and taught at the French academy from the seventeenth through the nineteenth centuries. That these fundamentals were part of the training of artists who would be willing and able to enhance the glory of Louis XIV's absolutist monarchy seems not to have undermined the popular enthusiasm their association with the "classical" past generated outside of France. Thus, the grand manner ideal was repeated, elaborated, and adapted by subsequent British and American artists, teachers, and aestheticians, both amateur and professional. Examples of filmic adaptations of grand manner aesthetics considered in this article include English director John Boorman's "The Emerald Forest" (1985) and Anglo-French director Roland Joffe's "The Mission" (1986), both British productions; Kevin Costner's "Dances with Wolves" (1990) and John McTiernan's "Medicine Man" (1992), both American productions with American directors; and Australian director Bruce Beresford's "Black Robe" (1991), a Canadian/Australian production based on Irish-born, Canadian novelist Brian Moore's best-selling novel of the same title (1985). While it might be argued that these films merely show the adaptation of academy-based grand manner ideals and principles to new imperialist interests, this article demonstrates how they educate and draw public sympathy to global environmental concerns, albeit with reference to a recognizably Western aesthetic tradition. Thus, the interest of this study to educators and students of the visual arts is twofold: (1) it demonstrates the continued adaptation and application of aesthetic principles originally developed in the seventeenth century to a technology-based medium; and (2) it shows how those aesthetic principles are currently applied in film to direct and modulate public opinion on matters well beyond the domain of pure or theoretical aesthetics. (Contains 16 notes.)