Edge of Ice

The 11th Hour(en)

A look at the state of the global environment including visionary and practical solutions for restoring the planet's ecosystems. Featuring ongoing dialogues of experts from all over the world, including former Soviet Prime Minister Mikhail Gorbachev, renowned scientist Stephen Hawking, former head of the CIA R. James Woolse

Worlds of Ice(en)

From the territories of the Arctic to the farthest reaches of the universe, Worlds of Ice shows us the astonishing omnipresence of ice.

Collemboli - L'armata sotterranea(it)

End to End: Svalbard(en)

Seven adventurers embark on an expedition in the world's most hostile environment, The Arctic. Starting from the Southernmost peninsula of Spitsbergen Svalbard, they travel to the Northernmost part of the Island lasting for 40 days.

The Alaska-Siberian Expedition(en)

Captain Kleinschmidt leads an expedition sponsored by the Carnegie Museum to the arctic regions of Alaska and Siberia to study the natives and the animal life.

Moving Ice(en)

Ice has always moved. When glaciation took hold some 34 million years ago, interconnected rivers of ice combined to produce the Earth's vast ice sheets. As temperatures slowly warmed glaciers developed a unique balancing act; advancing and retreating to calibrate their annual winter accumulation against summer melt. Sometimes calving colossal icebergs into the sea. A positive feedback loop that has regulated the movement of ice for millions of years.

Face to Face with the Polar Bear(fr)

Filmmaker Jerome Bouvier spent a year in Spitzberg following the incredible destiny of a polar bear family in a rapidly changing environment. Casting brother and sister twin cubs, this tale focuses on their education and reveals their individual characters.

Encounters at the End of the World(en)

Herzog and cinematographer Peter Zeitlinger go to Antarctica to meet people who live and work there, and to capture footage of the continent's unique locations. Herzog's voiceover narration explains that his film will not be a typical Antarctica film about "fluffy penguins", but will explore the dreams of the people and the landscape.

Arktis - Zwischen Licht und Dunkel(de)

Arktis is a poetic approach to the bizarre landscape of ice, rock, and water; a journey to the arctic ocean and surroundings, with images and sounds. Seventy one-second scenes of the arctic serve as the original material, which is then transformed in its texture, time lapse, color and light qualities to create a material reminiscent of landscape painting. The sound collage uses fragments from sounds of nature and samples from a piece of music for violin and song, which are also transformed in a manner similar to that of the visual pictures. (Jürgen Reble)

Winter's End(en)

A short film shot on Super 8 which captures the last days of winter.

Snowfall(en)

As a winter storm approaches the shallow water crystallizes, ice builds up along the edges of a stream, and the first snowflakes of the storm layer over the newly formed ice. The following morning a soft light approaches through the snow covered forest.

Wenn die Arktis schmilzt(de)

White Winter(de)

In southern Germany, winter can still be admired in all its glory every year. With its white coat of snow and icicles and myriads of small crystals that look like geometric works of art. In the valleys and on the slopes the snow is still so thick every year that the alpine huts are snowed in up to the windows. Cows and dairymen are safe in their farms at lower altitudes. But not the wild creatures of the mountains! They need strategies to survive the cold season and to defy snow masses, cold and ice. And some seem to do it so easily that they even raise their young in the middle of winter. But how do animals, plants and fungi cope with the annually recurring ice age, which from our perspective is a time of need? The many adaptations in nature prove that winter is an integral part of the natural cycle of the year and the living environment of species. They are adapted to cold and frost. That is why the animals and plants at the edge of the Alps suffer particularly from climate change!

La Voie arctique - Trois hommes à travers les glaces(fr)

Oceans The Mystery of the Missing Plastic(en)

99% of the plastic that should be floating in the oceans is missing. Even accounting for the plastic that washes up on beaches or is trapped in arctic ice, millions of tonnes has simply disappeared. As most plastic never deteriorates, it simply breaks down into smaller and smaller particles that are invisible to the human eye, what happens to this missing ocean plastic is a mystery. In this investigation, scientists embark in search of the micro-plastics. Small, mostly invisible, toxic, they are home to the new ecosystem: the plastisphere. But where are they? Ingested by organisms? Buried under the ocean floor? Degraded by bacteria? And what is the impact of them entering the food chain?

The Magical World of Moss(fr)

They have no roots, no seeds, no flowers, but mosses show immense survival capacities and can suspend their biological activity for long periods. Today, researchers are exploring the exceptional resistance of these archaic organisms. British ecologists have even resurrected a "zombie" moss that has been trapped in the permafrost for 1,500 years. Associated with decay and disliked in Europe, mosses are deified in Japan. With 25,000 species worldwide, bryophytes - their scientific name - are the seat of real ecosystems, and can develop in inhospitable landscapes, through an extravagant reproduction cycle.

Sailing the North Pole(fr)

This is a documentary about the expedition of Sebastien Roubinet et Rodolphe André who have decided to cross the Arctic Ocean from Alaska to the Norwegian islands of Spitsbergen, via the geographic North Pole! For this, Sébastien Roubinet has invented a strange little boat "TiBabouche" capable of sailing on sea and on ice. This boat is a prototype brimming with technology and science, made-up by Hervé Le Goff, a CNRS engineer. It will allow Hervé to calibrate the satellite “Cryosat”, the first one capable of measuring the thickness of ice.

Babouchka: The North Pole - A Return to Hell(fr)

To be the first in history of mankind to take a sailing vessel to the Pole. One of the greatest maritime adventures ever undertaken: to cross the Arctic Ocean from one Land to the Other without assistance.

Odyssées blanches(fr)

1947. The rush to the poles marked the beginning of an incredible human adventure to discover the last-remaining unknown lands. In France, Paul-E?mile Victor persuaded the government to finance expeditions to explore the Arctic and Antarctic. For the pioneers the conditions were Dantean, all in the name of science.

The Arctic: 66.5 Degrees North(de)

The beauty of the Arctic is breathtaking. For as long as we can remember, the Arctic has been associated with inhospitable cold. But the climate is changing, and with it the northern polar region, which begins beyond latitude 66.5 degrees north. Climate change is now happening four times faster north of the Arctic Circle than on the rest of the planet, making the future outlook dire. At the moment it is still possible for polar bears to raise their cubs, but hunting is becoming increasingly difficult on the drastically shrinking pack ice. The disappearance of the ice also affects the marine fauna. The wintry ice bridge between Canada and Greenland is threatened with collapse. The unstoppable melting of the permafrost, which has held the tundra together for thousands of years, is worrying. But the Arctic is still one of the wildest and loveliest regions on earth. A documentary visit to the Arctic - as long as it still exists.