In a quiet forest, a sign warns of radiation hazard. “Is this the past or the future?” muses the masked figure who appears like a kind of ghost in nuclear disaster areas. At a time when nuclear power may be re-emerging as an alternative to fossil fuels, this calmly observed and compelling tour takes us to places that may serve as a warning.
Centrales nucléaire : démantèlement impossible
Nucléaire, la grande explication
On April 26th, 1986, reactor four at Chernobyl nuclear power station explodes, sending an enormous radioactive cloud over Northern Ukraine and neighbouring Belarus. The danger is kept a secret from the rest of the world and the nearby population who go about their business as usual. May Day celebrations begin, children play and the residents of Pripyat marvel at the spectacular fire raging at the reactor. After three days, an area the size of England becomes contaminated with radioactive dust, creating a 'zone' of poisoned land. Based on Mario Petrucci's award-winning book-length poem (split over two books), 'Heavy Water: a film for Chernobyl', and the shorter version 'Half Life: a Journey to Chernobyl", tells the story of the people who dealt with the disaster at ground-level: the fire-fighters, soldiers, 'liquidators', and their families.
On April 26, 1986, a 1,000 feet high flame rises into the sky of the Ukraine. The fourth reactor of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant just exploded. A battle begins in which 500,000 men are engaged throughout the Soviet Union to "liquidate" the radioactivity, build the "sarcophagus" of the damaged reactor and save the world from a second explosion that would have destroyed half of Europe. Become a reference film, this documentary combines testimonials and unseen footage, tells for the first time the Battle of Chernobyl.
Poliske was contaminated with radioactive material after the 1986 Chornobyl disaster. Soviet authorities did everything they could to erase the ancient history of this town, and after Chornobyl, they destroyed its future.
Tchernobyl : nuage radioactif sur la France
Nucléaire, l'impasse française
After consolidating itself as a tourist destination in the mid-1960s, this small coastal village has become the dormitory town for the workers of a Nuclear Power Plant. With the liberal promise of prosperity and socioeconomic wellfare, many workers left their homes to move to the small city and started working at the new Nuclear Power Plant. The collective unrest and the silence, cut off by the great gusts of wind, articulate the landscape of the village that is now under the aid of the Nuclear Power Plant.
Ma vie à côté de la centrale
December 21, 2015. The image of a fox was captured by a camera inside the unit 2 building at Fukushima No.1 nuclear power plant... A film-essay about contemporary Japan in the aftermath of March 2011 earthquake.
Fukushima's Minami-soma has a ten-centuries-long tradition of holding the Soma Nomaoi ("chasing wild horses") festival to celebrate the horse's great contribution to human society. Following the meltdown of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in the wake of the March 11, 2011 earthquake and tsunami, local people were forced to flee the area. Rancher Shinichiro Tanaka returned to find his horses dead or starving, and refused to obey the government's orders to kill them. While many racehorses are slaughtered for horsemeat, his horses had been subjected to radiation and were inedible. Yoju Matsubayashi, whose "Fukushima: Memories of the Lost Landscape" is one of the most impressive documentaries made immediately after the disaster, spent the summer of 2011 helping Tanaka take care of his horses. In documenting their rehabilitation, he has produced a profound meditation on these animals who live as testaments to the tragic bargain human society made with nuclear power.
Wolsong: Vanishing Town
Filmmaker Jean Chabot looks at the use of nuclear energy in Quebec. Do we need this expensive and dangerous energy?
In October 2023, a European research team succeeded in generating an enormous amount of energy from very little fuel. A success that fusion research had been working towards for around 70 years. Now the competition for a fusion reactor has been reignited. What role can electricity from nuclear fusion play in the future?
Filmmaker Jamie Redford embarks on a surprising journey across the U.S. to meet entrepreneurs, community activists and ordinary citizens who are pioneering the use of clean energy technology, often in the most unlikely places, in the process creating jobs, turning profits and making Americans’ lives healthier.
The Crowds of Chernobyl explores the reasons behind people's fascination with the (arguably) most famous exclusion zone in the world, the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone. The film attempts to explain the drive behind the 'dark tourism' industry that has blossomed in the nuclear wasteland since 2011, when the site was opened up for tourists. As the interviews from a wide of people unravel why some (including the interviewees) might even make the zone a permanent part of their life; the haunting and provoking visuals invite the viewer to make up their own mind.
A sequel to 2006's Who Killed the Electric Car?, director Chris Paine once again looks at electric vehicles. Where in the last film electric cars were dismissed as uneconomical and unreliable, and were under multiple attacks from government, the auto industry, and from energy companies who didn't want them to succeed, this film chronicles, in the light of new changes in technology, the world economy, and the auto industry itself, the race - from both major car companies like Ford and Nissan, and from new rising upstarts like Tesla - to bring a practical consumer EV to market.
20 years ago the small town of Wunsiedel was at the edge: businesses had to close, jobs were lost, locals left for good. When a bunch of idealists decided to stop this race to the bottom. They developed a plan not only to put the region's energy supply on a completely new foundation, but also to create new prospects.
The documentary presents the results of research on nuclear waste management in the U.S., Russia, Germany and France. The authors Eric Noualhat Guéret and Laure were accompanied by the independent French laboratory technicians radiation control, CRIIRAD. They have detected and measured radiation in many places like the U.S. Columbia River or the French plutonium factory called reprocessing plant at La Hague.