The Amber Time Machine

A story about survival, belief in the physical memory of things, as if still-life was always part of the scientific possibility or of the nightmare of extinction.

A documentary of insect life in meadows and ponds, using incredible close-ups, slow motion, and time-lapse photography. It includes bees collecting nectar, ladybugs eating mites, snails mating, spiders wrapping their catch, a scarab beetle relentlessly pushing its ball of dung uphill, endless lines of caterpillars, an underwater spider creating an air bubble to live in, and a mosquito hatching.

Darwin's great insight – that life has evolved over millions of years by natural selection – has been the cornerstone of all David Attenborough’s natural history series. In this documentary, he takes us on a deeply personal journey which reflects his own life and the way he came to understand Darwin’s theory.

A Documentary on the Creation of OVO, by Cirque du Soleil

Collar de moscas

A scientist explains how the savagery and efficiency of the insect world could result in their taking over the world.

Luis Buñuel’s observation – “You can find all of Shakespeare and de Sade in the lives of insects” – was the inspiration for this experimental horror movie, in which human actors wordlessly enact the life-cycles of wasps and bees. Its purpose is to depict with emotion, humor and unnerving specificity an alternative society that really exists and has nothing to do with human beings. A highly stylized depiction of nature in all her deceitful glory.

Renowned paleontologist Kirk Johnson takes us on an epic adventure through time at the polar extremes of our planet. Following a trail of strange fossils found in all the wrong places—beech trees in Antarctica, hippo-like mammals in the Arctic—Johnson uncovers the bizarre history of the poles, from miles-high ice sheets to warm polar forests teeming with life. What caused such dramatic changes at the ends of the Earth? And what can the past reveal about our planet’s climate today—and in the future?

In this playful essay film, the filmmaker investigates our culture's discomfort with all things many-legged.

„The Fabulous Insects – Ants“ shows the diversity, beauty and exciting strategies of ants in their respective habitats. Whether in the tropics of South America or in the native climes of Europe - the world of ants is full of surprises. The biomass of ants and humans in the world is about the same. Next to us, ants are probably the most adaptable creatures on the planet. Whether rainforest, savannah, forests or moors - ants populate every terrestrial habitat. You can observe particularly exciting natural history not only in the distant tropics, but also in densly populated Central Europe.

The World's Biggest and Baddest Bugs, follows host Ruud Kleinpaste, as he embarks on an entomological odyssey around the globe in search of the ultimate biggest and "baddest" creepy crawlies. The World's Biggest and Baddest Bugs will then profile the "stars" of the show, with Ruud explaining in his audience-friendly style exactly what makes them so amazing.

Perturbation

„The Fabulous Insects – Beetles“ presents colourful and bizarrely shaped species as well as the largest beetle in the world, in its habitat in the South American rainforest. The film also shows that the colourful diversity and beauty of beetles and their exciting natural history can be experienced right on our doorstep, in Central Europe. In aesthetic and never-before-seen macro slow-motion and time-lapse shots, the viewer experiences the world of beetles, which is more beautiful, colourful and surprising than many of us realise. No other group of animals on earth is so diverse: beetles come in a wide variety of ‘models’, from miniature versions a quarter of a millimetre in size to large versions twenty centimetres long. Some beetles flaunt jewel-like iridescent colours, while others wear plain black. Some come in eye-catching warning colours, while many wear an astonishing camouflage.

In a race against developers in the Rocky Mountains, paleontologists uncover a unique fossil site packed with astonishingly well-preserved bones of mammoths, mastodons, and other giant extinct beasts. The discovery opens a highly focused window on the vanished world of the Ice Age in North America.

In Egypt's Sahara Desert, massive skeletons with strange skulls and gigantic teeth jut out from the sandy ground. This fossil graveyard, millions of years old, is known as the "Valley of the Whales." Now, paleontologists have unearthed a whole new species of ancient whale dating to 43 million years ago, and this predator wasn't just able to swim – it also had four legs and could walk. Follow scientists as they search for new clues to the winding evolutionary path of mammals that moved from the land into the sea to become the largest animals on Earth.

Deep inside the arctic, scientists are experimenting with extreme palaeontology methods to unlock the secrets of polar dinosaurs, and perhaps the key to our own survival on Earth. On Alaska's north slope there are dinosaur bones, lots of them. But they're trapped in an icy tomb - an impenetrable wall of permafrost. Dinosaurs on Ice follows the journey of two scientists, Dr Tom Rich and Dr Tony Fiorillo, who undertake separate expeditions to the Colville River in Alaska's far north to uncover the dinosaurs' bones and break the ice on a prehistoric world that until now has been unreachable. But the task is not easy. The weather is extreme, the location remote.

In May 2002 a group of people went looking for dinosaur and here is what they found!

Sixty-six million years ago, an asteroid wiped out the dinosaurs in a fiery global catastrophe. But we know little about how their successors, the mammals, recovered and took over the world. Now, hidden inside ordinary-looking rocks, an astonishing trove of fossils reveals a dramatic new picture of how rat-sized creatures ballooned in size and began to evolve into the vast array of species—from cheetahs to bats to whales to humans—that rule our planet today.

This film was produced as an extension of a research film on the metamorphosis of the fly. It successively shows the hatching of the eggs, the nutrition and growth of the larvae, swarming and underground penetration, the formation of the pupa, metamorphosis and organization of the adult insect.

This documentary delves into the mysteries surrounding the Neanderthals and what their fossil record tells us about their lives and disappearance.