Sangduen Chailert, or Lek, as she is generally known, has already rescued over 200 elephants. She has dedicated her life to saving the Asian elephant and founded a special camp, The Elephant Nature Park to protect them. We follow this winner of Time Magazine’s “Asian Hero of the Year” Award in her work. Lek is on a mission to save the Asian elephant in her native Thailand. This film looks at the plight of the Asian elephant, as it goes from being a widely used domestic animal, to becoming a burden on modernizing communities. With experts predicting its extinction within four decades, Lek’s work is needed now more than ever and she has gathered a large group of supporters and volunteers in her quest for a better future for the Asian elephant. This moving film demonstrates Lek’s natural understanding of and rapport with these huge animals and will stir the viewers emotions as it highlights the often desperate state some elephants are kept in.
A look at global sex tourism, focusing on the situation in Venezuela and Thailand.
A talented group of orphaned children in Swaziland create a fictional heroine and send her on a dangerous quest.
In Uganda, AIDS-infected mothers have begun writing what they call Memory Books for their children. Aware of the illness, it is a way for the family to come to terms with the inevitable death that it faces. Hopelessness and desperation are confronted through the collaborative effort of remembering and recording, a process that inspires unexpected strength and even solace in the face of death.
A documentary about the story of what's in Warat's head with politics and the film industry through his movie “Secret Among Wings”
Street art, creativity and revolution collide in this beautifully shot film about art’s ability to create change. The story opens on the politically charged Thailand/Burma border at the first school teaching street art as a form of non-violent struggle. The film follows two young girls (Romi & Yi-Yi) who have escaped 50 years of civil war in Burma to pursue an arts education in Thailand. Under the threat of imprisonment and torture, the girls use spray paint and stencils to create images in public spaces to let people know the truth behind Burma's transition toward "artificial democracy." Eighty-two hundred miles away, artist Shepard Fairey is painting a 30’ mural of a Burmese monk for the same reasons and in support of the students' struggle in Burma. As these stories are inter-cut, the film connects these seemingly unrelated characters around the concept of using art as a weapon for change.
This 2004 documentary by Werner Herzog diaries the struggle of a passionate English inventor to design and test a unique airship during its maiden flight above the jungle canopy.
A documentary about environment destruction in the Amazon and the tribes living there. Produced for the 48th anniversary of MBC, Korea. A brilliant records of the itinerary for 250 days through the Amazon.
This documentary examines ayahuasca shamanism near Iquitos (a metropolis in the Peruvian Amazon), and the tourism it has attracted. The filmmakers talk with two ayahuasqueros, Percy Garcia and Ron Wheelock, as well as ayuahuasca tourists and local people connected with the ayahuasca industry.
Orangutan Rescue - Back to The Wild
Tsunami 2004 : ils ont filmé la catastrophe du siècle
Are tourists destroying the planet-or saving it? How do travelers change the remote places they visit, and how are they changed? From the Bolivian jungle to the party beaches of Thailand, and from the deserts of Timbuktu, Mali to the breathtaking beauty of Bhutan, GRINGO TRAILS traces stories over 30 years to show the dramatic long-term impact of tourism on cultures, economies, and the environment.
Documentary about the harpy eagle, which feeds on monkeys.
Elephants disrupt the lives of a family deep in the jungles of Northern Siam, and an entire village.
A short documentary chronicling the personal lives and narratives of Thai "ladyboys," who are born men but present themselves as women, living openly in Thai society. The film interviews ladyboys from all walks of life-- performers, filmmakers, activists-- to learn what it's like to live in a society with visible gender fluidity, and to explore if Thailand is really as open to and accepting of sexual diversity as it seems.
The movie recalls children who suffered mental and physical harm both during the last century, particularly in religious orphanages, and during the time of early modernperiod witch-hunts. It shows that the mindsets and behavioural patterns of both time periods are more alike than one might think.
The Boxing Day Tsunami in 2004 was the most devastating natural disaster in modern times, killing 228,000 people across 13 countries in just a few hours. AFTER THE WAVE tells the untold story of this epic forensic operation in Thailand to identify and return home the bodies of over 5,000 victims, both locals and holidaymakers from around the world. Led by a crack Australian team, the best forensic specialists from around the world were in a race against time to give back every victim their identity. Creating forensic history, the international team’s mantra from the outset was ‘we will take them home’, a seemingly impossible ambition but one that almost succeeded. In this film forensic science intersects with powerful stories of survival and loss, attempting to make some sense out of a tragedy so bewilderingly complete that nearly a decade out it still seems far-fetched to most of us.
The enthralling, against-all-odds story that transfixed the world in 2018: the daring rescue of twelve boys and their coach from deep inside a flooded cave in Northern Thailand.
American animal trapper Frank Buck travels with Ali, his "number one boy," on an expedition into the Malayan jungle. From their jungle headquarters just north of Singapore, Frank, Ali and a team of native helpers roam the area from Northern Johore to Perak in search of interesting wild animals, reptiles and birds. Hoping to find a tiger, Buck captures a monitor lizard and a black leopard, while another black leopard narrowly escapes an encounter with a giant python and then battles a bigger and stronger tiger. After trapping a spotted leopard, Frank adopts a baby honey bear and a baby elephant. The team catches an orangutan, but the tiger eludes their camouflaged pit. Meanwhile, Frank visits the "bathing festival" of a local tribe and watches as tribesmen kill an intruding spotted leopard with blow darts. The tiger then meets an enormous regal python, who has just crushed a crocodile, and fights to a draw with it.
Moving to Mars charts the epic journey made by two Burmese families from a vast refugee camp on the Thai/Burma border to their new homes in the UK. At times hilarious, at times emotional, their travels provide a fascinating and unique insight not only into the effects of migration, but also into one of the most important current political crises - Burma.