
160 km southwest of Reunion Island, just a few dozen metres beneath the surface of the Indian Ocean, lies the peak of an underwater volcanic structure known as Mont La Pérouse. The base of this enigmatic geological formation lies 5000 meters below sea level, with a size comparable to that of Mont Blanc. Permanent currents and strong winds characterise this site in the open seas, culminating in complex diving conditions under which Laurent Ballesta, together with his Gombessa diving team and local researchers had to navigate in order to conduct the study in depth. Further techniques such as observation and photographic inventory, biological and geological sampling, and the use of cameras and sonars were employed in this challenging expedition.

7.1The Living Sea celebrates the beauty and power of the ocean as it explores our relationship with this complex and fragile environment. Using beautiful images of unspoiled healthy waters, The Living Sea offers hope for recovery engendered by productive scientific efforts. Oceanographers studying humpback whales, jellyfish, and deep-sea life show us that the more we understand the ocean and its inhabitants, the more we will know how to protect them. The film also highlights the Central Pacific islands of Palau, one of the most spectacular underwater habitats in the world, to show the beauty and potential of a healthy ocean.
6.8Peter Gimbel and a team of photographers set out on an expedition to find and film, for the very first time, Carcharodon carcharias—the Great White Shark. The expedition lasted over nine months and took the team from Durban, South Africa, across the Indian Ocean, and finally to southern Australia.
6.0This cinematic journey into the waters off East Africa chronicles the story behind artist Damien Hirst's massive exhibition of oceanic treasures.
10.0For canyoning enthusiasts, the Trou de Fer on Reunion Island is a must-see, and not just for the faint-hearted. The first complete descent of the canyon, with a 1,000-meter drop, was made by Thierry Krattinger, Stéphane Girard, and Jean-Claude Dobrilla in 1990. Filming took place in very difficult conditions: an aquatic atmosphere, a dramatic void, and mediocre rock in the 300-meter waterfall. The documentary Trou de Fer was selected for competition at the Trento Film Festival in 1992.
7.9Thanks to new excavations in Mauritius and Madagascar, as well as archival and museum research in France, Spain, England and Canada, a group of international scholars paint a new portrait of the world of piracy in the Indian Ocean.
8.6Ocean Souls Films and Wildlife Media unite 100+ filmmakers, scientists, and leading experts to shine a bright, new spotlight on humanity’s closest living relatives - cetaceans (whales, dolphins, and porpoises). New footage and scientific discoveries reveal the extraordinary world beneath the ocean’s surface, where these majestic beings exhibit characteristics not unlike ours in terms of emotions, language, family, intelligence, and human interaction. Directed by Philip Hamilton, this multi-award-winning film inspires people to care and want to protect the oceans.
For nine months in 1930, seven Bretons, lobster fishermen, were "forgotten" on a volcanic island by their employers, Normans from Le Havre, heirs of the last French whalers. Four employees would die on the spot. Their descendants today revive the memory of this human tragedy which also struck 42 Madagascans. Starting from a sordid social conflict, the documentary shows that the “Forgotten Saint Paul” mark the end of an era of “colonization”, a term rarely used for the French Southern Territories, but nevertheless close to reality. This is the story of the Third World, as its discoverer, Yves de Kerguelen, named it.
8.0Explore the mysterious giant rings of the Mediterranean, buried at a depth of 120m, with the world-famous Laurent Ballesta, world-renowned diver and his team, to understand the origin of these unique and unknown formations.
8.5In French Polynesia, there is a place where every year, thousands of groupers gather in secret followed by hundreds of sharks… The photographer, diver and biologist Laurent Ballesta, with his team, wanted to better understand what motivates these fish to wait until the exact day of the full moon to spawn all at once! With the help of researchers from the CNRS of Moorea, they dived and conducted numerous experiments to study and witness this unique phenomenon. Taking advantage of this period of incredible richness, Laurent Ballesta did a record dive of 24 hours at over 20 meters.
6.8Gombessa Expedition 4 Laurent Ballesta went to observe a gathering of thousands of groupers during the full moon of June 2014 (Le mystère mérou) in the southern pass of the Polynesian atoll of Fakarava, where he discovered a pack of over seven hundred grey sharks. How can this unprecedented density be explained? Could it be that social behaviors govern this wild horde? During three years of preparation, he and the other divers on his international scientific team tamed their fear by abandoning the defensive reflexes that provoke shark aggression, with the aim of slipping into the heart of the raging pack to study and film it from the inside. Sharks fitted with microchips, receiving antennas, hydrophones, an ark of 32 synchronized cameras...: a whole technological arsenal is mobilized for the project. As the groupers approach for their annual spawning, what battle plan will the sharks deploy?
8.2Gombessa Expedition 1 To dive for the Coelacanth is to go back in time. In 1938, when it was known only as a fossil, a Coelacanth was discovered in South Africa in a fisherman's net. This species bears witness to an evolutionary bifurcation 380 million years ago, and bears the marks of a great event: the day the fish left the ocean for the open air. Does it hold the secret to the transition to walking on land? In 2010, a marine biologist and outstanding diver, Laurent Ballesta, took the first photographs of the Coelacanth in its ecosystem. In April 2013, divers and researchers set down their equipment at the Sodwana base camp in South Africa, in the club founded by Peter Timm (who died in 2014). Six weeks of extreme diving at depths of over 120 meters, in an attempt to film the Coelacanth with a double-headed camera, collect its DNA and tag a subject with a satellite-linked beacon...
6.9On his ship "Calypso," as well as in a submarine, Jacques Cousteau and his crew sail from South America and travel to Antarctica. They explore islands, reefs, icebergs, fossils, active volcanic craters, and creatures of the ocean never before seen. This voyage took place in 1975, and Captain Cousteau became one of the first explorers ever to dive beneath the waters of the frozen South Pole.
10.0Ancient Caves brings science and adventure together as it follows paleoclimatologist Dr. Gina Moseley on a mission to unlock the secrets of the Earth’s climate in the most unlikely of places: caves. Moseley and her team of cave explorers travel the world exploring vast underground worlds in search of stalagmite samples – geologic “fingerprints” – that reveal clues about the planet’s climate history. Their quest leads them to some of the world’s most remote caves, both above and below the water, in France, Iceland, the Bahamas, the U.S. and Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula. Together, they go where very few humans will ever go, revealing the incredible lengths scientists will go to study the unknown.
8.0Wildlife documentary is a must see for all nature lovers but is also suited for scuba divers in search of new dive sites.
6.6Deep-sea diver/former propagandist Leni Riefenstahl explores the undersea world of coral reefs in various oceans around the world.
8.2The Mediterranean. Because people have been travelling there for thousands of years, it is believed to be without secrets. And yet, far below its surface, lie vast unexplored territories, luxurious gardens worthy of the finest tropical coral reefs. These natural wonders are inaccessible to the traditional diver, in a twilight zone, between 60 and 120 m, where there’s less than 1% of sunlight. If diving at such depths is always a challenge, staying there is a fantasy, a utopia that becomes reality in Planet Mediterranean. In the tradition of Commander Cousteau and his "houses under the sea," the team of diver-photographer Laurent Ballesta is undertaking a new world-record setting mission in complete freedom and without time limit.



