The Films

Ten films from four continents in two hours* give expression to what we're feeling—hope and cynicism, climate denial and climate grief, rage and heartbreak, resilience and resolve—and offer paths toward climate empowerment.

America's leading voice on climate, Bill McKibben, co-founder of 350.org and Third Act, is the Honorary Judge and launches the Festival in a videotaped introduction.

 

"These movies hit us viscerally . . . " --Bill McKibben

*Extended cut is 3 hours.

The Mud On Their Hands

The Mud on Their Hands

Jason Whalen, Director

USA (14:06) DOCUMENTARY

On the Mississippi Delta, rebuilding a town torn apart by Hurricane Katrina is half the battle. For this pastor, climate change and protecting the next generation from storm surge become his new calling.

I Was Just a Child

I Was Just a Child

Breech Asher Harani, Director

PHILIPPINES (5:05) NARRATIVE

From a child's point of view and told with shadow puppets, Super Typhoon Bopha devastates towns and families in the Philippines.

I Want You To Panic

I Want You to Panic!

Moritz Hoffmann, Director

GERMANY (9:20) COMEDY

A bomb lands in a museum without exploding. The ambitious museum director sees an opportunity. The museum guard sees something else.

EXTENDED CUT

Discarded

Ilana Goldman, Director

UNITED STATES (7:03) NARRATIVE/DANCE

Wearing a dress made of plastic trash she generated over 4 months, a dancer embodies both Earth and Woman reckoning with human impact on our teetering environment.

EXTENDED CUT

Loa's Promise

Joshua A. Dawson, Director

UNITED STATES (7:00) ANIMATION/EXPERIMENTAL

An unsettling vision of outcomes of free-market resource exploitation, an alternate history and hypothetical future. A desert’s ghost towns are retrofitted as data centers and digital mines, obliterating memory. 

The Sprayer

The Sprayer

Farnoosh Abedi, Director

IRAN (8:45) ANIMATION

Is this a vision of where continued nature exploitation will bring us? Or is it a satire of where it already has? Heroes have a role in either case.

The Operator

The Operator

Matt Riley, Director

UNITED KINGDOM (20:00) NARRATIVE

Connecting long-distance intergalactic calls is usually boring. This call is different. It's life or death for those on the line. An allegory for the Anthropocene age.

Ola Ka Honua

Ola Ka Honua

Jilli Rose, Director

AUSTRALIA (22:00) ANIMATION

Auwahi, a storied forest in Maui, is healed and restored in a generation with help from many who decided to try when trying seemed daunting.

Feeling the Apocalypse

Feeling the Apocalypse

Chen Sing Yap, Director

CANADA (7:02) ANIMATION

An experienced psychotherapist wrestling with climate grief explores what it means to live in a dying world.

EXTENDED CUT

City Reindeer

Kaisu Koski, Director

UNITED KINGDOM (9:27) DOCUMENTARY/EXPERIMENTAL

Filmed in the Arctic Circle, this visually stunning film considers the climate crisis a relationship problem. A series of interspecies "picnics" aims to begin restoring relationships with the nonhuman, starting with our relative, the Reindeer.

EXTENDED CUT

Cracked

Mahmut Tas, Director

TURKEY (5:00) NARRATIVE

Water sources dwindle and drought affects a little girl's imagination and her precocious drawings. From her mother, who prays and struggles to ration what water they have, the daughter keeps a secret alive and finds hope for herself.

Sacrificed

Sacrificed

David Sanchez, Director

CANADA (12:43) DOCUMENTARY

Flavie is a daring and opinionated 15-year-old practicing civil disobedience. Her parents want to support her activism but fear the legal fallout.

Calamity TV

Calamity TV

Ryan Vemmer, Director

RHODE ISLAND, USA (1:07) COMEDY

How would you pitch a script to Hollywood about the coming end of civilization?

Baby Dolphins

Baby Dolphins

Kevin Delobelle, Director

FRANCE (3:54) NARRATIVE

An ardent activist and an unmoved executive come face to face with one another and---for one of them---with oneself.

EXTENDED CUT

Gen Z Mental Health: Climate Stories

Tehya Jennett, Director

UNITED STATES (8:30) DOCUMENTARY

Gen Z'ers share their tools for emotional resilience and reveal how climate change is shaping their mental health and fundamental life choices.

EXTENDED CUT

The Farm Under the City

Brett Chapman and Jordan Carroll, Directors

UNITED KINGDOM (10:00) DOCUMENTARY

His closed-loop system takes food waste from eateries and businesses and uses organic cycling methods, including worm farms and hot composting, to grow micro-herbs and vegetables beneath the industrial streets of Sheffield, England.

Produced by Merlyn Climate Grants

MERLYN CLIMATE GRANTS SUPPORTS EMERGING CLIMATE LEADERS 13 TO 30 in NY/NE

JOIN THE TOUR IN '24

Host a screening at your community's campus, arts center, library, museum, or congregation.

POST-FESTIVAL WORKSHOP

Join this half-day online experience to share, connect, and help process your thoughts and feelings about climate change. Ages 18+.

SPONSOR AND DONATE

Support our grant-giving by sponsoring a film or making a donation.