ARTE Distribution

The island of Noirmoutier on the Atlantic coast of France. When the sun rises over the salt marshes, Fabrice's working day begins. Unlike many others, he neither takes the car, nor does he travel by train or bicycle. He simply walks to the salt marshes where he will spend his day. He is a "saunier", a salt worker. It is hard to make a living from salt, the elemental component of the ocean. One depends on the sun, the wind, the rain. Being a saunier is more than just a profession. It is a philosophy of life, a bond with nature.

This 10-episodes series takes you to 10 destinations in all continents, for an anthropological and cultural dive, as well as a reflection on our globalized consumption patterns. An invitation to travel in the most beautiful way in the last bastions of countries customs and cultures.
 
10 episodes for 10 locations (to be confirmed):
 
1- The camel market of Nouakchott in Mauritania
2- The loincloth market of Cotonou in the Republic of Benin
3- The falcon market of Doha, Qatar
4- The fish market of Jagalchi in Busan, South Korea
5- The floating market of Cai Rang in the South Vietnam
6- The insects market of Skun in Cambodia
7- The jasmin market of Madurai in India
8- The esoteric market of Mexico City in Mexico
9- The wish market of Puno in Peru
10- TBC

Let us meet the men and women who make these markets a place of commercial and cultural exchange. While the globalized economy leads a standardization of tastes and consumption, going to a market allows you to dive immediately into the culture of a country, to meet its inhabitants, its food, its smells, its colors, its costumes. An invitation to travel in the most beautiful way, to feast our eyes with nature’s plentiful and diverse bounty, and meet people from different cultures around the world that makes the heart of these markets beat.

Every culture creates its own rituals to face the stages that punctuate our lives (being born, growing up, seducing, bonding and dying), and each episode of this series will focus on 2 different cultures and their different or similar way to handle it. 

Being born, growing up, seducing, bonding, dying: this cycle of life is immutable. It is the very foundation of our condition as a human being, beyond culture. It leads them inexorably towards the end – after all, to advance in life is to approach death, and from this point of view, to live becomes a frightening adventure! This is why humans have invented accompanying rituals that allow life to be structured in specific stages: the collective rituals of passage from one state to another allow the individual to construct a levelheaded perception of their mortal condition.
 

Meet those who, throughout the world, celebrate these “passages of life”. Purification, isolation, pain, transformation of the body: each group has its own practice, its beliefs, its prohibitions, which reveal its identity. To share with them these ritual is to penetrate at the heart of their culture, to understand their fears, their desires, their vision of life, their way of responding to “the difficult task of growing up”.

It allow us to question our own anxieties and perspectives and reflect on the usefulness of these ritualized occasions. Today, our Western societies are becoming more and more emancipated from them: people are free to live out their love with whomever they choose, cremation is secular, and graduating is no longer a widely recognized official entry into the world of adults. What do rites of passage bring to practitioners? How do they help them to pass a stage in life? How do they change the ones performing them?

Follow the footsteps of an international mission developing groundbreaking solutions to save the Great Barrier Reef and its 9,000 unique species from destruction.

These species interact with the coral to form a complex and delicate ecosystem dependent on each other for survival. Yet today the coral—and therefore all the organisms that depend on it—is gravely at risk. In a visually stunning series of one the most beautiful natural habitats on Earth, our international award winning crew has followed a team of scientists for 5 years. Their mission is to develop groundbreaking technological solutions to save the GBR from destruction.

Beneath the oceans’ surface, thousands of volcanoes have yet to be discovered or explored. Mount La Pérouse is one of these sleeping giants, off the coast of Reunion Island. It is a genuine oasis of life that could be sheltering sprawling coral reefs.

The scientific expedition “La Pérouse” has made it its goal to reveal the sunken haven's secrets. This geological anomaly is only known to a few    Réunionese longline fishers who regularly enjoy miraculous catches there. But as for oceanographers, they still consider the area to be a true “terra incognita”, a mystery to solve. To date, no diver has ever approached it.
What kind of species lives there and at what depth?  What predators feed there? Are there any rare, or even unknown, fish? To what birds and marine mammals is it home?
Underwater GPS, photogrammetry, environmental DNA, 3D cartography, with the help of the most modern scientific techniques, all will be revealed about one of the last virgin territories on Earth, located in the French economic zone. Embark on an unprecedented human and scientific adventure.

Hernin and Marcellin Abong are two Vanuatu twin brothers with very different backgrounds: one has become the “Very Great Chief” of his tribe, while the other is an ethno-archaeologist. 

Their culture is slowly but surely disappearing forever. To keep a record of it, they both delve into the most remote parts of Vanuatu in search of the customs and rites of their people. On foot and by canoe, their journey takes them to grandiose and isolated territories, to discover spectacular and unknown rituals, even for them.

We are thrilled to present the WILDLIFE & DISCOVERY COLLECTION!

CLICK HERE TO DISCOVER THE INTERACTIVE COLLECTION

Guillaume and Marie, professional wildlife photographers, venture to far-flung corners of the world, with their 3-year old daughter, to capture on film the lives of animals in their natural habitats.
 

They invite us to share their unique way of life, the secrets of their profession, and their experiences with the people they meet. Each episode focuses on a particular animal and their individual characteristics. Each time, Guillaume and Marie return with a detailed photographic account of their adventures.
 
 
 

From India to the Bijagos archipelago, discover the world’s last matriarchies through the stories of the women who run them. Each of the five films of this collection is an immersion in one of these societies, through the eyes of a woman.

Discover the heart and diversity of our living planet. With stunning images and unique stories of mankind's relationship with these natural wonders, Season 2 reveals never-before filmed volcanoes.
 

Together, for the scientific aspect of the episode, we explore the very diverse range of questions raised by volcanic phenomena in such varied fields as earth sciences, climatology, biodiversity, oceanography, geography, agronomics, and archaeology. The cultural part of the show delves into mythology, religion, philosophy, folk and artistic traditions, cooking, and ways of life. No two volcanoes are alike; each one has its own distinctive landscape, climate, and geological context. Just as unique are the people we meet along the way who help us comprehend how greatly our planet – and our lives – have been shaped by volcanic phenomena.

Fire dancing in Papua New Guinea or climbing to the top of the Ethiopian cliffs to introduce one’s child to God: this series reveals how some people today still practice rituals that structure their lives and become, beyond a simple social bond, a structuring force and a source of culture.

In societies that struggle to find their bearings, rituals - whether pagan or mysterious - are of particular importance when people are confronted with the unknown, illness, death, not knowing what tomorrow is made of. Rituals help organise chaos, warding off our fears and bringing to light the meaning in our lives.
Anthropologist, Anne-Sylvie Malbrancke, helps us understand and experience these moments with those who practice them.​

A remarkable series portraying heritage in a world undergoing profound change.

We travel to the planet’s 34 most beautiful coastal and maritime destinations. On the beaches, coasts and islands of all the world’s continents we discover societies with little-known cultures, in natural environments that are often endangered.
All in 20 minutes.