ARTE Distribution

Volcanoes dominate human life in the most surprising ways. Half a billion people live at their feet. They are essential to our existence but may cause our doom.

This blue chip 4 x 52' (and more to come) takes us to 40 volcanoes filmed across 6 continents over 2 years to learn about sacred volcanos, beneficial volcanos, and destructive volcanos to tell the amazing story of the symbiotic link between men and these fire mountains.
Volcanoes led to dinosaurs’ extinction and wiped entire civilizations – like the Minoans in Crete and Santorini in 1450 BCE. Today, the lives of 600 million people are threatened by 1670 active volcanoes. The entire planet is affected: when Mount Pinatubo erupted in the Philippines, global temperatures fell by nearly 1°C for three years. Recent studies suggest that humankind will eventually be wiped out by a gigantic volcanic eruption…
But volcanoes are not just destroyers of world, they also nurture life. It is thought that they may have helped creating life on Earth. Even today, certain wildlife species such as the giant Galápagos tortoise are only found on particular volcanoes. Human beings have always flocked to settle volcanoes in huge numbers to take advantage of their fertile soil, pleasant climate and natural heat sources. Many are even worshipped as deities.

Insomnia, sleep apnea, and narcolepsy are massively increasing in the world. In a scientific investigation, we will discover the new methods developed to find sleep: fractional sleep, light therapy, helmets that stimulate the brain. 

Consequences are huge: sick leave from work, billions of dollars lost for companies, and worse: obesity, diabetes, early Alzheimer. The science of sleep has become a major priority for researchers, so much so that the Nobel Prize in medicine has just been awarded for the discovery of the internal biological clock. 

Moss is at the origin of life on Earth 450 million years ago and helped develop multiple different ecosystems. A world tour to discover this incredible primitive system that fascinates scientists.

We travel to Japan, Iceland, France, Ireland and Denmark to meet experts who study moss for various disciplines: biotechnology, climatology, nuclear contamination, and evolutionary biology. Visually moss covered landscapes are absolutely stunning and mysterious, and offer a great background to tell our story.
 
CLICK HERE TO SEE THE MOOD BOARD!
 

Nature is an inexhaustible source of knowledge. After 3 billion years of evolution, it has created amazing mechanisms, even at a microscopic level, that allow plants and animals around us to protect themselves, to grow, to move or to face the attacks of the elements. 

This "nanoworld" questions our imagination with its beauty and intelligence. Scientists have finally managed to unravel its mysteries, thanks to photonics. Let’s take an unprecedented journey into this other dimension, in which nature-inspired solutions are found to meet the meet the ecological and climatic challenges that threaten us.

NANOWORLD, THE KEY TO OUR SURVIVAL won the Grand Prize at the 2021 Deauville Green Awards.

We are thrilled to present you our NEW SCIENCE COLLECTION!
CLICK HERE TO DISCOVER THE INTERACTIVE LINE-UP

For MIP TV we are shining a spotlight on science, a great way to understand of the world around us better, with our thematic collection gathering the best scientific documentaries, from outer space to genetics, along with some answers for our health... 

Human consciousness, which is unique in the living world, has remained a mystery of divine origin for thousands of years. But today, recent and spectacular scientific progress (from medical imagery to quantum physics) is starting to shed light on it.

I think therefore I am. But who thinks inside of us? Who are we? This film takes us on a journey beyond our brains. Like conscience, human intelligence has propelled Man to the peak of evolution, giving him the opportunity to dominate the world. And yet today, intelligence would see to have broken down. Average IQ is dropping. Through this investigation into the nature of intelligence and multiple intelligences, we discover the reasons for this breakdown, and how we can give our intelligence another boost, thanks to scientific progress, including brain cell transplants.

To most of us, plants make up a familiar background decoration, albeit a beautiful one, but we don't really pay them that much attention, nor do we know much that about them. This collection is an invitation to discover more about four common plants and their astonishing properties.

Scientists, farmers, economists and sociologists will help us to view the Nettle, the Arabis, the Yew and the Lotus in a different light, as they reveal the plants' uses and new technological, medical, economic and social properties. The collection features interviews with geneticists, the head gardener at the Chateau of Versailles, an Indian industrialist and an Australian botanist, among other professionals, as they invite us into their laboratories, on their expeditions to the ends of the earth, or quite simply, around their gardens.

At a time when our society is in full reflection on its relationship to biodiversity, we travel the world to discover in what way these plants have become our partners in life.

We delve into the secret life of four ordinary plants, and discover their "extraordinary" side:
- the nettle, a symbol of the fight against merchandising living things
- the lotus, a tool-box for tomorrow's technologies, inspired by nature
- the yew, a medicinal tree, the new "green gold" threatened by over-exploitation
- the arabis, a little-known plant that has become the new worldwide star of genetic research

Our brain constantly simplifies reality, opening the door to false logical thought patterns: cognitive biases. These intuitive mechanisms create errors of judgment affecting individual and societal behaviours, that marketing loves to play with, giving birth to fake news.

There is a multitude of biases anchored deep in our brain that leads to errors of perception, evaluation, interpretation... Originally, their function is to allow our brain to save time and energy by developing mental shortcuts. They also facilitate our sociability. In the complexity of our modern world though, this cerebral trick sometimes turns against us, and certain ancestral mechanisms are no longer adapted to the reality of our daily life. Marketing and advertising never stop playing with them; swindlers exploit them for their own benefit; fake news are spread thanks to them. Thus, a better understanding of how it works is a real individual and societal challenge.

200 years ago, Champollion "cracked" the hieroglyph code. Follow a scientific investigation to discover this mysterious writing and a new expedition into the largest tomb in Egypt.

From the heart of the excavation site of Theban Tomb TT33 near Luxor, the largest in Egypt and a palace of hieroglyphs, we shall discover the secrets of this mysterious writing. We'll have exclusive access to follow the IFAO (French Institute of Oriental Archeology in Cairo) on their scientific mission to uncover the priests, scribes, painters, engravers and tomb builders who bequeathed the history of Ancient Egypt to us along the walls of burial chambers and on papyrus. Who where this class apart in the population at the service of Pharaohs who so intrigue today's archeologists? What do the inscriptions reveal about the daily life of Egyptians? A plunge into the great adventure of the hieroglyphs.
 
VIRTUAL VISITS DEIR-EL MÉDINA 
EVE RAMBOZ, VFX SUPERVISOR 

SUMMARIZED SYNOPSIS

In remote Morocco, in 1960, in the archeological site of Jebel Irhoud, a remarkable find was made: remains of Homo Sapiens. Today we can date them back to 300.000 years old.

A discovery that rewrites the story of Mankind’s origins, because up until now, the oldest remains found went back to 200.000 years ago! A revelation that not only stretches the timeline of Homo Sapiens’ story, but also changes the geography of where we came from, the whole sub-Sahara region.