Borneo, the world’s oldest rainforest, a culture near extinction. All destroyed by a sporting event viewed by billions. Three brothers from the forest, a film crew and their activist friends become undercover investigators, following the stolen wood to its final stop: Tokyo’s new Olympic Stadium.
TOUCH WOOD plays out in the build-up to the approaching Olympic spectacle, the camera following a group of friends across oceans, through a spectrum of cultures, to reveal an honest tale of a peoples’ attempt to understand the forces behind the destruction of their home. This journey, however, is not without dangers. Spying on illegal companies has obvious risks but the alienating world they discover on the way has more sinister perils.
In this character-driven documentary, the brothers are a symbol of the exploited. The Tokyo Olympics in contrast typifies the insatiable consumer society validating this type of profiteering. Whilst highlighting these clear injustices, TOUCH WOOD provides a window into how indigenous peoples view the world that is driving so much change within their own communities. In doing so, exploring the costs of humanity’s addiction to progress and the effect it is having on the globe’s most vulnerable peoples and the ecosystems they inhabit.
14 Women, 3000 Nautical Miles, X Trillion Pieces of Plastic.
X TRILLION is a film about an all-woman crew who sailed 3000 nautical miles to one of the most remote places on Earth - the North Pacific Gyre or the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. The aim was to research the densest accumulation of ocean plastic in the world.
It was a journey that promised to change not only their lives but the very future of our planet.
Director Eleanor Church was part of a team of 14 women from around the world - from scientists to packaging designers, engineers, teachers, artists and more - each one looking and learning about this issue from a very different perspective. This was eXXpedition's 10th voyage.
The crew spent three weeks sailing through the middle of this gyre, collecting scientific data for international research projects with a focus on how these trillions of pieces of micro plastics are impacting human, and particularly women’s, health.
This is a story of hope, filled with life, magic and a call to action that burns with optimism.
Focusing on conservationists around the world as they attempt to catalogue a new version of the comprehensive tally of global wildlife. First created in 1964 and under the umbrella of the London-based International Union for the Conservation of Nature, the Red List has become widely accepted as a definitive tally of the status of species globally.
After a devastating earthquake Nga, an old elephant, feels the end of the world coming as well as his own death. His “mahout”, Sanra, the last guardian of the immemorial elephant cemetery, readies himself for a final journey with Nga, his friend and life's companion. At dawn, they leave their camp and enter the jungle, pursued by a band of poachers, avid to capture the treasure contained in the cemetery.
And so begins a journey placed under the sign of mourning and reincarnation, accompanied by a hypnotic monologue that leads us ever deeper into the jungle. One after the other, the poachers all die in mysterious and violent circumstances. Arriving at the cemetery, the spectator is the last witness of a nocturnal journey to another world.
“Does killing elephants help to save the species? The 'Trophy Hunters’ of the exclusive Dallas Safari Cub believe so, and they, alongside other hunters give a surprising insight into their world and their perspective on wildlife preservation.
With exclusive access to the Dallas Safari Club, a behind the scenes trip into the hidden world of big game hunting, where millionaires bid to hunt endangered species. Following them from the auction room to the African continent, where they claim that their sport actually saves lives in bringing much needed funds to impoverished communities, and help in the conservation effort.
Each year, the club itself comes under intense media scrutiny and severe criticism for it’s annual big game auction, and it is here that the arguments in favour of trophy hunting can be heard at their most impassioned.
For the first time a documentary film crew is given access into the club's inner circle, giving the opportunity to some of the world’s most prolific (professional and amateur) Trophy Hunters to tell their side of this story.
This revealing and at times shocking film seeks to shine a light on the big questions in this debate. Does trophy hunting actually help or hinder conservation? In this most expensive of ‘sports’ where does their money go, and who ultimately benefits?
Through the eyes of people who became convinced of a date for the end of the world, Right Between Your Ears explores how people believe, how we turn beliefs into certainties, and mistake them for the truth.
A stock trader with a young family, a philosophy student about to graduate, a retail manager who became so convinced she quit her job of 18 years. As they face the consequences of their conviction, neuroscience and social psychology offer insight into how we can become convinced we’re right, even when we're wrong.
The People's Cloud is a project investigating the ecology and impact of cloud computing on the lives of those who use it, the places it is physically located in and the people who work to maintain it. Traveling Europe in search of the infrastructure of the internet, the film surveys the acoustic properties of such locations and their relationship with the overall environmental and geopolitical impact of mobile data storage. Interviews take place with engineers, technicians, manufacturers, marketing experts, salespeople, economists, husbands, wives, family members, academics, cultural thinkers and artists and we discover what 'the cloud' means to them and what this data boom has meant to their lives.
