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PRE PRODUCTION SHORT TEASER
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LONGER Teaser
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TREATMENT
FORMAT/GENRE : An artful documentary feature film made together WITH wildlife
THEMES: Interspecies communication, connection, learning and our urgent climate crisis.
LOGLINE:
"A free diving dancer from Ireland, communicates with wild humpback whales, through movement and dance in the middle of the Pacific.
A film on interspecies love,
worth holding your breath for ... "
Short Synopsis
August 2017: Lifelong performer and oxytocin researcher Chloé Pisco met her first wild whale underwater. The two shared a dance duet which changed her life.
Pisco spent eight weeks underwater in Tonga and Australia, eye-to-eye with these individuals and their unique personalities. She returns now alongside indigenous dancers whose own ancestors had defining relationships with these very whales. Footage of these dances show moments of deep connection, entangled in transformative lessons.
She speaks on land with Aboriginal Australian Elders, marine biologists and neuroendocrinologists about science, empathy and the language of love.
A story told in a non linear way, for whales.
Team so far:
Director / writer / Producer: Chloé Pisco.
See here for FILM BIOG
- Co- Director / co-writer: Katie McNeice - (Lambing, Who we love)
See here for FILM BIOG
- Long list of possible 3rd Co-Directors being approached and in discussion, all First Nations Filmmakers.
- Underwater DoP: Julie Gautier - (Ama, One breath around the world)
- Documentary film mentor: Kim Bartley - (Pure Grit and Herstory Ireland’s Epic women)
- Editor and mentor: Kersti Grunditz-Brennan - (Blöd, Marie's Attitude)
- First AD / production co-ordinator: my sister Amelia de Buyl-Pisco - (Bring them down, Callan's Kicks, Float like a Butterfly)
In developing discussions with Producers:
* Rosa Tran - Executive producer role (Anomalisa, I'm Thinking Of Ending Things, Final Space.)
* Amy Taylor - Creative Producer role (Milked)
* Zlata Filipovic - Line Producer role (the Farthest, When Women Won)
Statement from the director :
In 1970 the LP “Songs of the Humpback Whale” changed the course of our planet forever, igniting the entire conservation movement from “Save the whales” t-shirts, to COP 26, and Greta. Why? Because their songs evoked a clear emotional response in us: we felt how they felt and were mobilised to act!
Dances with whales will be the next step. Embodying in the audiences the wholly transformative experience of being loved by a 25 metre being. And what that does to you as tiny human creature.
I’ve had lucid dreams about flying with whales since I was a child and still do. After now spending years with whales above and below the water; I realise, as linear time is a human construct. It possibly doesn't even exist in the animal world. This made me feel so seen.
I think my ADHD brain might be part whale, or at least nonlinear––more like a mind map of interlinked ideas and feelings; I barely experience time in a line and now I know whales don’t. To me, my ADHD is a superpower making me see and feel time all at once, nonlinear, much like my storytelling.
I am a 42 year old queer, neurodivergent, circus / dance performer / director. For 22 years I worked in this field until I injured my spine and bruised my brain, losing mobility and balance, all during the pandemic. That combined with the non stop intense pain, all contributed to my first time having suicidal depression. It was phenomenal, overwhelming. I needed to heal myself and start living like I was part of the world again.
So I did, I made a choice to heal in radical ways and it worked. I had been studying oxytocin for ten years by the time I met my first whale, but it was only when I had this encounter that my understanding finally dropped into my body in a physical way.
Struck by the shared bonds between all living things, I saw the fight against time for humans to finally start living as whales do; with empathy, compassion and with love.
That's what fuelled me to invest in my own healing and what drives me now to make this film.
Questions at the heart of the FILM:
→ Do whales express themselves artistically?
→ Can we communicate interspecies through non verbal means?
→ Do whales love us back?
(Answer: Yes, yes and yes.)
→ Can we learn to experience existence like whales, by learning to communicate with them? A linguistic relativity interspecies perceptual exchange perhaps.
Think “Arrival” meets “My Octopus Teacher” via “Everything, Everywhere, All At Once”, the latter because of the nonlinear nature of the moments whales exist in.
→ Who are we not to care about animals who genuinely love us and rescue us?
Elements remaining unclear:
We don’t know what the whales will teach us, about ourselves, about existence or about the nature of connection, the universe or beyond.
→ How will the encounters impact the dancers? How will that change them and our audience?
→ Did the very ancestors of these individual whales connect with the very ancestors of our individual dancers?
→ Was the humpback whale population changed by the pandemic? Did the 3 years that Tonga remained shut to tourists, (shutting down the entire whale tour industry until now), affect the wellbeing of the whales?
→ Do whales express themselves artistically?
→ Can we communicate interspecies through non verbal means?
→ Do whales love us back?
(Answer: Yes, yes and yes.)
→ Can we learn to experience existence like whales, by learning to communicate with them? A linguistic relativity interspecies perceptual exchange perhaps.
Think “Arrival” meets “My Octopus Teacher” via “Everything, Everywhere, All At Once”, the latter because of the nonlinear nature of the moments whales exist in.
→ Who are we not to care about animals who genuinely love us and rescue us?
Elements remaining unclear:
We don’t know what the whales will teach us, about ourselves, about existence or about the nature of connection, the universe or beyond.
→ How will the encounters impact the dancers? How will that change them and our audience?
→ Did the very ancestors of these individual whales connect with the very ancestors of our individual dancers?
→ Was the humpback whale population changed by the pandemic? Did the 3 years that Tonga remained shut to tourists, (shutting down the entire whale tour industry until now), affect the wellbeing of the whales?
SUMMARY of PROJECT
PROLOGUE
In 2017 Chloé had her first whale dance back at her, move for move and eye to eye. Everything changed from that moment on.
Since she has had dozens more danced encounters over 8 intense weeks of underwater research, freediving and dancing with whales, across Australia and in Tonga.
Neither Scientist nor filmmaker originally. Chloé then found herself researching for years, and filming huge amounts of footage, writing about the complex behaviour of these whales and expanding what is known about them. Especially around their connection habits.
Over this time she has learnt how to optimise the quality of the encounters, on the whale’s terms, how to read their consent or intentions. This is key.
Examples include: using sail boats not motor boats, staying in one spot for 8 nights at a time, to allow the whales to get used to you and even sleep, safe and snoring around the boat.
Bringing musicians who can sing on board and play music, which lured the whales to the boat. And allowed them to choose to interact with us. Electing to have connective moments with us, on their terms. Rather than it being a chase, on a capitalist business clock.
The bonds built then are much stronger, avoiding harassment and produce much more profound encounters that last way longer. This is why we are shooting the majority of this film on sail boats. The difference is phenomenal and invited these types of encounters.
She has a long list of very special moments shared with whales she has experienced. Which she plans to share with her new dance communicators, our film crew and global audiences. These experiences have generated a sort of wish list or draft of shots for the next shooting days.
THE NEXT SHOOTS
Chloé will bring a group of professional dancers to Nguthungulli’ and K’Gari (in Australia) as well as to Vava’u in Tonga: to learn to freedive, and then introduce them to some wild humpback whales.
These dancers will be mostly indigenous Australians and Tongans, and all will be experts in movement communication and expression. Our main protagonists are: The dancers and the whales. Diving into these big blue worlds, profound places where their own ancestors have explored and existed for millenia.
Aboriginal Australian culture is some of the oldest living cultures on earth, over 100,000 years at latest estimations. Many Nations of these cultures have had spiritual relationships with whales, this is why it is important to centralise this interspecies connection that has been alive and active for so long.
Throughout the variety of magical meetings underwater, our main characters will learn from the whales, and how they like to be met.
The whales will teach us what they want to teach us. On their own terms.
We will bring musical artists on board, to sing to the whales, as they do themselves. To lure them to the boat. An experience proven by Chloé to work.
We will invite the experts in science, marine biology, neurochemistry, Indigenous culture (Elders) and beyond; to join us onboard, (although some we will speak to in their own spaces. E.G. Elderly Elders.) Sharing these casual genuine conversations before, during and after the ocean expeditions, viewed from a fly on the wall perspective.
THE CRUX of the film will be the encounters themselves. The danced communication, the interspecies exchange of information.
The oxytocin surging for both species, and the mirror neuron-ing between whale and human!!!! (Including our audience.)
And for our audiences to truly feel they are one of us: most of all, we will show how the encounters affect the dancers and perhaps the whales.
In the case of the dancers, the moment their faces emerge right out of the water, we will ask them how they feel ? What was it like? And film their teary eyes as they light up with emotion and ecstasy at being witnessed in their whole heart by these massive, truly loving beings.
We will follow them into conversations, later onboard the boat as they reflect on their day and their encounters.
Our audiences will mirror neuron the crap out of this emotion and that is the heart of the film. We want to share the experience of feeling so seen and cared for … by a whale.
Structurally we will intercut between the expert conversations and the underwater encounters.
We may also leave huge sections of underwater non verbal communicative encounters as totally silent, or at least with no speaking whatsoever. How it is for us dancers.
Adde Notes to Summary:
Our dancers are all incredibly passionate about powerful communication through art and dance; working on affecting that very expert phenomenon for this film, but this time, interspecies! We will communicate non verbally/non acoustically through a dance and body language exchange…with wild humpback whales.
A language older than time.
The director spent 8 weeks underwater doing this successfully in Tonga and Australia. Now it’s time to go back with our extraordinary team to explore our questions and get the shots we need to share our ideas with the world.
Pisco has been researching oxytocin since 2012 and in her recent MA thesis research, she proved that this empathy hormone is increased when we engage in live arts.
These whales build real bonds with us. They not only make oxytocin, the very same empathy and bonding hormone that 95 % of humans make, they rescue other species. There are countless scientific accounts and even studies on the reports of whale altruistic behaviours, especially interspecies rescues. It baffles us as a species, because we are not very smart sometimes.
Most humpback whales also express themselves through dance and song.
Is that Art? Let’s start with what is art?
Our favourite definition: Art is an individual’s particular perspective expressed creatively. So whales are singing and dancing about their perspective on their own rich and complex worlds.
There is communicative language in that.
Pisco wants to decode it.
She wants to understand them.
Build a database of movement language.
After all, dance is an expressive format that delivers much larger and broader date packets than mere verbal sentences.
Communicating non verbally through dance interspecies is very significant.
Creating movement to communicate is art...
Art itself is creative expression.
Expression is a form of communication.
Communication involves connection.
Connection is at the heart of the internal oxytocin neurochemical tides of all mammals.
We are connecting to them and building bonds through this interchange of communicated ideas / feelings / data.
And in truth, dancers and artists know, art has the ability to transmit much larger and complex data packets than mere words in an email for example. That's why it's a whole other language.
A language we share with animals.
So when we dance these duets, we are not only sharing feelings through communication, not only are we building bonds, we are learning from them what it's like to be a whale.
How it feels.
Eco tourism is often chasing mother and calf whale pairs, with loud motor boats - to exhaustion, and until they renounce their autonomy.
Capitalising on bullying these whales, and at the same time capitalising on the human desire for connection - oxytocin.
Pisco found a more authentic connection, that includes their consent, with and from these 25 metre beings with complex sentience, empathy, nuanced social bonds, altruism towards other species, (documented multiple times across the globe), huge hearts and giant brains that produce enormous amounts of oxytocin.
This happens in their habitat, all while avoiding scaring them, or crossing their “unspoken” boundaries.
During her 8 weeks underwater, the whales taught her how to understand them and their consensual boundaries. Tonga, specifically is a birthing ground where Pisco encountered dozens of mother calf pairs.
She will show how this happens when it handled well, and when it is not.
The Climax, as planned so far, is to have shots of whales and dancers in the same frame having
DANCED DUET conversations.
Playing a game of memory, where one does a move and the other responds with the same and then adds a move. Pisco did this in Tonga and it worked over and over again. Especially with the baby whale calves. We may even get to witness / document one of the many times that whales act altruistically.
We know that once we are shooting, in situ with wild animals, other gifts and opportunities for themes will become apparent. Further storyline resolutions will become clear after the fact, during the edit.
Our goal as we lure people in with the dancing and singing whales… is to bond them to our subjects and then hit them with the hard truths.
I want everyone to feel what it's like to feel connection and care from a 25 metre oxytocin producing mammal!
You are transformed and are able to embody the truth:
We are not alone. Ever.
We are loved and a part of an infinite inter-affective web of interspecies co-investment, dependence and care.
We are not just part of nature,
WE ARE NATURE
It is TIME TO FECKING ACT LIKE IT
PROLOGUE
In 2017 Chloé had her first whale dance back at her, move for move and eye to eye. Everything changed from that moment on.
Since she has had dozens more danced encounters over 8 intense weeks of underwater research, freediving and dancing with whales, across Australia and in Tonga.
Neither Scientist nor filmmaker originally. Chloé then found herself researching for years, and filming huge amounts of footage, writing about the complex behaviour of these whales and expanding what is known about them. Especially around their connection habits.
Over this time she has learnt how to optimise the quality of the encounters, on the whale’s terms, how to read their consent or intentions. This is key.
Examples include: using sail boats not motor boats, staying in one spot for 8 nights at a time, to allow the whales to get used to you and even sleep, safe and snoring around the boat.
Bringing musicians who can sing on board and play music, which lured the whales to the boat. And allowed them to choose to interact with us. Electing to have connective moments with us, on their terms. Rather than it being a chase, on a capitalist business clock.
The bonds built then are much stronger, avoiding harassment and produce much more profound encounters that last way longer. This is why we are shooting the majority of this film on sail boats. The difference is phenomenal and invited these types of encounters.
She has a long list of very special moments shared with whales she has experienced. Which she plans to share with her new dance communicators, our film crew and global audiences. These experiences have generated a sort of wish list or draft of shots for the next shooting days.
THE NEXT SHOOTS
Chloé will bring a group of professional dancers to Nguthungulli’ and K’Gari (in Australia) as well as to Vava’u in Tonga: to learn to freedive, and then introduce them to some wild humpback whales.
These dancers will be mostly indigenous Australians and Tongans, and all will be experts in movement communication and expression. Our main protagonists are: The dancers and the whales. Diving into these big blue worlds, profound places where their own ancestors have explored and existed for millenia.
Aboriginal Australian culture is some of the oldest living cultures on earth, over 100,000 years at latest estimations. Many Nations of these cultures have had spiritual relationships with whales, this is why it is important to centralise this interspecies connection that has been alive and active for so long.
Throughout the variety of magical meetings underwater, our main characters will learn from the whales, and how they like to be met.
The whales will teach us what they want to teach us. On their own terms.
We will bring musical artists on board, to sing to the whales, as they do themselves. To lure them to the boat. An experience proven by Chloé to work.
We will invite the experts in science, marine biology, neurochemistry, Indigenous culture (Elders) and beyond; to join us onboard, (although some we will speak to in their own spaces. E.G. Elderly Elders.) Sharing these casual genuine conversations before, during and after the ocean expeditions, viewed from a fly on the wall perspective.
THE CRUX of the film will be the encounters themselves. The danced communication, the interspecies exchange of information.
The oxytocin surging for both species, and the mirror neuron-ing between whale and human!!!! (Including our audience.)
And for our audiences to truly feel they are one of us: most of all, we will show how the encounters affect the dancers and perhaps the whales.
In the case of the dancers, the moment their faces emerge right out of the water, we will ask them how they feel ? What was it like? And film their teary eyes as they light up with emotion and ecstasy at being witnessed in their whole heart by these massive, truly loving beings.
We will follow them into conversations, later onboard the boat as they reflect on their day and their encounters.
Our audiences will mirror neuron the crap out of this emotion and that is the heart of the film. We want to share the experience of feeling so seen and cared for … by a whale.
Structurally we will intercut between the expert conversations and the underwater encounters.
We may also leave huge sections of underwater non verbal communicative encounters as totally silent, or at least with no speaking whatsoever. How it is for us dancers.
Adde Notes to Summary:
Our dancers are all incredibly passionate about powerful communication through art and dance; working on affecting that very expert phenomenon for this film, but this time, interspecies! We will communicate non verbally/non acoustically through a dance and body language exchange…with wild humpback whales.
A language older than time.
The director spent 8 weeks underwater doing this successfully in Tonga and Australia. Now it’s time to go back with our extraordinary team to explore our questions and get the shots we need to share our ideas with the world.
Pisco has been researching oxytocin since 2012 and in her recent MA thesis research, she proved that this empathy hormone is increased when we engage in live arts.
These whales build real bonds with us. They not only make oxytocin, the very same empathy and bonding hormone that 95 % of humans make, they rescue other species. There are countless scientific accounts and even studies on the reports of whale altruistic behaviours, especially interspecies rescues. It baffles us as a species, because we are not very smart sometimes.
Most humpback whales also express themselves through dance and song.
Is that Art? Let’s start with what is art?
Our favourite definition: Art is an individual’s particular perspective expressed creatively. So whales are singing and dancing about their perspective on their own rich and complex worlds.
There is communicative language in that.
Pisco wants to decode it.
She wants to understand them.
Build a database of movement language.
After all, dance is an expressive format that delivers much larger and broader date packets than mere verbal sentences.
Communicating non verbally through dance interspecies is very significant.
Creating movement to communicate is art...
Art itself is creative expression.
Expression is a form of communication.
Communication involves connection.
Connection is at the heart of the internal oxytocin neurochemical tides of all mammals.
We are connecting to them and building bonds through this interchange of communicated ideas / feelings / data.
And in truth, dancers and artists know, art has the ability to transmit much larger and complex data packets than mere words in an email for example. That's why it's a whole other language.
A language we share with animals.
So when we dance these duets, we are not only sharing feelings through communication, not only are we building bonds, we are learning from them what it's like to be a whale.
How it feels.
Eco tourism is often chasing mother and calf whale pairs, with loud motor boats - to exhaustion, and until they renounce their autonomy.
Capitalising on bullying these whales, and at the same time capitalising on the human desire for connection - oxytocin.
Pisco found a more authentic connection, that includes their consent, with and from these 25 metre beings with complex sentience, empathy, nuanced social bonds, altruism towards other species, (documented multiple times across the globe), huge hearts and giant brains that produce enormous amounts of oxytocin.
This happens in their habitat, all while avoiding scaring them, or crossing their “unspoken” boundaries.
During her 8 weeks underwater, the whales taught her how to understand them and their consensual boundaries. Tonga, specifically is a birthing ground where Pisco encountered dozens of mother calf pairs.
She will show how this happens when it handled well, and when it is not.
The Climax, as planned so far, is to have shots of whales and dancers in the same frame having
DANCED DUET conversations.
Playing a game of memory, where one does a move and the other responds with the same and then adds a move. Pisco did this in Tonga and it worked over and over again. Especially with the baby whale calves. We may even get to witness / document one of the many times that whales act altruistically.
We know that once we are shooting, in situ with wild animals, other gifts and opportunities for themes will become apparent. Further storyline resolutions will become clear after the fact, during the edit.
Our goal as we lure people in with the dancing and singing whales… is to bond them to our subjects and then hit them with the hard truths.
I want everyone to feel what it's like to feel connection and care from a 25 metre oxytocin producing mammal!
You are transformed and are able to embody the truth:
We are not alone. Ever.
We are loved and a part of an infinite inter-affective web of interspecies co-investment, dependence and care.
We are not just part of nature,
WE ARE NATURE
It is TIME TO FECKING ACT LIKE IT
CHARACTERS
* The WHALES
* The dancers: dance and physical communication experts, musicians, poets and artists - mostly indigenous Australian and Pacific islanders.
* The knowledge experts, including Indigenous Elders and science consultants.
* Science itself as a character, represented by marine behavioural experts, neuroendocrinologists and even physicists, ( The latter to speak on time experiences as animals.). A nuance discourse as most academics will not admit their opinion on animal sentience, complexity or empathy in public. Most of them are still trapped by the hierarchic power structures that their stakeholder institutions are built on. And those are really stuck in the dark ages where human supremacists ideals over nature and animals are the norm.
DANCERS and FREE DIVERS:
→ Chloé Pisco, the instigator of all of this. She has lucid dreamt of whales and dolphins, even becoming one, since she was a child. She chased her dream of connection, communicating and expressing herself with whales, into reality.
→ Tyrel Dulvarie - Ex Bangarra Dancer and a proudly from Gimuy, he is a descendant of the Yirrganydji, Djirrabul, Kalkadoon and Umpila peoples.
→ Yolanda Lowatta - Ex Bangarra Dancer and a proud Giedi woman born on Thursday Island. She is a descendant of Yam Island in the Torres Strait and is also of Papua New Guinean and Fijian heritage.
→ Waangenga Blanco -
(The above three dancers are coincidentally also featured heavily in the Netflix distributed film Firestarter about Bangarra dance company.)
→ Jilli Balu Riley is a Djabugay and Muluridji man from the Kuranda area of Far North “so called” Queensland, Australia. He is an acrobat for C!RCA, a dancer and even a self taught free diver who spearfished since he was young.
→ Guy Ritani - Proud Takatapui Māori non binary, artist, dancer, activist, designer and permaqueer educator from Aotearoa ( New Zealand.)
→ Dominique “Domi” Abraham - A Papuan New Guinean Australian woman, International teacher of freediving for Molchanov, underwater mermaid performer and safety diver. Her passion for meditation, relaxation and vagus nerve releases / somatic experiencing all inform her teaching practice in free diving.
She will be our underwater mama. Her partner Harry, also a safety free diver and excellent teacher, (along with their two year old will be onboard).
→ Freedive champion Amber Bourke - Incredible multiple record holding free diving World champion from Brisbane, and safety free diver.
→ Some of our indigenous advisers
(All artists participating, especially Indigenous folks, will have editorial power over their image and sound.)
Expert Discussions:
* The WHALES
* The dancers: dance and physical communication experts, musicians, poets and artists - mostly indigenous Australian and Pacific islanders.
* The knowledge experts, including Indigenous Elders and science consultants.
* Science itself as a character, represented by marine behavioural experts, neuroendocrinologists and even physicists, ( The latter to speak on time experiences as animals.). A nuance discourse as most academics will not admit their opinion on animal sentience, complexity or empathy in public. Most of them are still trapped by the hierarchic power structures that their stakeholder institutions are built on. And those are really stuck in the dark ages where human supremacists ideals over nature and animals are the norm.
DANCERS and FREE DIVERS:
→ Chloé Pisco, the instigator of all of this. She has lucid dreamt of whales and dolphins, even becoming one, since she was a child. She chased her dream of connection, communicating and expressing herself with whales, into reality.
→ Tyrel Dulvarie - Ex Bangarra Dancer and a proudly from Gimuy, he is a descendant of the Yirrganydji, Djirrabul, Kalkadoon and Umpila peoples.
→ Yolanda Lowatta - Ex Bangarra Dancer and a proud Giedi woman born on Thursday Island. She is a descendant of Yam Island in the Torres Strait and is also of Papua New Guinean and Fijian heritage.
→ Waangenga Blanco -
(The above three dancers are coincidentally also featured heavily in the Netflix distributed film Firestarter about Bangarra dance company.)
→ Jilli Balu Riley is a Djabugay and Muluridji man from the Kuranda area of Far North “so called” Queensland, Australia. He is an acrobat for C!RCA, a dancer and even a self taught free diver who spearfished since he was young.
→ Guy Ritani - Proud Takatapui Māori non binary, artist, dancer, activist, designer and permaqueer educator from Aotearoa ( New Zealand.)
→ Dominique “Domi” Abraham - A Papuan New Guinean Australian woman, International teacher of freediving for Molchanov, underwater mermaid performer and safety diver. Her passion for meditation, relaxation and vagus nerve releases / somatic experiencing all inform her teaching practice in free diving.
She will be our underwater mama. Her partner Harry, also a safety free diver and excellent teacher, (along with their two year old will be onboard).
→ Freedive champion Amber Bourke - Incredible multiple record holding free diving World champion from Brisbane, and safety free diver.
→ Some of our indigenous advisers
(All artists participating, especially Indigenous folks, will have editorial power over their image and sound.)
- Dalisa Pigram - a proud Yawuru/Bardi woman and Artistic co - director of MARRUGEKU company - Sydney/ Broome
- Rachael Maza - A proud Yidinji from North Queensland, Meriam from the Torres Strait Island of Mer, and Dutch on her mother’s side. Rachael is Artistic Director of ILBIJERRI Theatre Company.
Expert Discussions:
- Alexis Pauline Gumbs - Author of Undrowned: BLACK FEMINIST LESSONS from MARINE MAMMALS.
- Dr Nan Hauser - President & Director of the Center for Cetacean Research & Conservation Marine biologist in the Cook islands, whose life was saved by a humpback whale.
- Tyson Yunkapota - Author of SAND TALK: How indigenous thinking can save the world.
- Meleika Gesa-Fatafehi - a Torres Strait Islander and Tongan storyteller whose writing work focuses on poetry and climate change.
- Vanessa Woods and Brian Hare - Authors of Survival of the Friendliest.
- Paul Watson - Co - Founder of Greenpeace and founder of Sea Shepherd who's entire life was changed by the altruism of a whale.
- Katie Payne - First to recognise the whale sounds were actual song/ music and co producer of Songs of the Humpback Whale 1970.
- Philip Wollen - Animal advocate and philanthropist, co founder of Sea shepherd Australia.
- Tentative and delicate research is ongoing to establish exactly what sharing of which knowledge, from a long list of indigenous elders recognised as having specific connections with whales, is appropriate and safe for them to share, (from Australia, Tonga, Aotearoa - New Zealand and North America.)
Below is a sample of the RAW UNEDITED FOOTAGE from my research in TONGA and Australia.
Broader Topics, Issues, Themes
Pacific Islanders, indigenous Australians and whales are not the main cause of the climate crisis or even plastics pollution. Mostly, they cause none of it.
But they are disproportionately affected by it. Rising sea levels plus temperatures, oxygen dead zones and the pollutants in the seas are destroying their homes and threatening their survival. Many of the actual land will disappear in the next decades. As will the liveable oceans.
According to the world inequality database, 50 % of Co2 emissions are emitted by the richest 10 % of humans, that clearly does not include man of the Pacific ocean’s native peoples or any whales.
When marching for Climate Crisis, In Stockholm, alongside Greta Thunberg and her Climate warriors. Chloé researched her homemade protest placard stats as well as a political speech she wrote for the Swedish feminist party on "Ecofeminism: the links between feminism and the climate crisis".
She wondered: how much money does one have to have, in total assets etc, to be in the top 10% of financially richest people on earth?
The answer: 63,000 euros, (in 2019 according to the global stats gathered by Credit Suisse.)
And as the top 20 % of richest people are responsible for 70 % of Co2 emissions, total assets needed to belong to this group was 2200 euros, (same source.)
That is terrifying.
This means, it is probably everyone reading this now, and me.
And the vast majority of people who will see this film.
We are the 10% or at best the 20 %.
We are the cause of 70 % of the Co2.
It's us.
WE need to change our behaviour.
With the food we eat, the clothes we buy, the houses we build, the cars we drive, the films we watch, the planes we ride…every decision we make contributes to this global crisis and the mass extinction event currently ravaging the natural world on every level.
What CAN we do?
In a world where 70 % of wildlife and 50 % of plant life has been destroyed, nature is in total freefall.
87 % of the world’s oceans are damaged by human impact. It is crucially urgent to show people what we can learn from the animals living in the ocean, why we need to protect them, (it produces 60 % of our oxygen for one), and that we are actually ONE animal family.
New modelling evidence suggests we can halt and even reverse habitat loss and deforestation if we take urgent conservation action and change the way we produce and consume food
CENTRALLY, It is about making visible Aboriginal knowledge: Cultures that have known how to exist, as part of and as one with nature in a sustainable way, with a much longer track record of success than the current failing system of value.
Attempting to decolonise our minds and relationships, from the ideologies that build our global unconscious biases. This destructive, unspoken sense of supremacy over nature, animals, plants and of course over historically strategically othered humans, is not benefitting anyone but the usual culprits.
Pacific Islanders, indigenous Australians and whales are not the main cause of the climate crisis or even plastics pollution. Mostly, they cause none of it.
But they are disproportionately affected by it. Rising sea levels plus temperatures, oxygen dead zones and the pollutants in the seas are destroying their homes and threatening their survival. Many of the actual land will disappear in the next decades. As will the liveable oceans.
According to the world inequality database, 50 % of Co2 emissions are emitted by the richest 10 % of humans, that clearly does not include man of the Pacific ocean’s native peoples or any whales.
When marching for Climate Crisis, In Stockholm, alongside Greta Thunberg and her Climate warriors. Chloé researched her homemade protest placard stats as well as a political speech she wrote for the Swedish feminist party on "Ecofeminism: the links between feminism and the climate crisis".
She wondered: how much money does one have to have, in total assets etc, to be in the top 10% of financially richest people on earth?
The answer: 63,000 euros, (in 2019 according to the global stats gathered by Credit Suisse.)
And as the top 20 % of richest people are responsible for 70 % of Co2 emissions, total assets needed to belong to this group was 2200 euros, (same source.)
That is terrifying.
This means, it is probably everyone reading this now, and me.
And the vast majority of people who will see this film.
We are the 10% or at best the 20 %.
We are the cause of 70 % of the Co2.
It's us.
WE need to change our behaviour.
With the food we eat, the clothes we buy, the houses we build, the cars we drive, the films we watch, the planes we ride…every decision we make contributes to this global crisis and the mass extinction event currently ravaging the natural world on every level.
What CAN we do?
In a world where 70 % of wildlife and 50 % of plant life has been destroyed, nature is in total freefall.
87 % of the world’s oceans are damaged by human impact. It is crucially urgent to show people what we can learn from the animals living in the ocean, why we need to protect them, (it produces 60 % of our oxygen for one), and that we are actually ONE animal family.
New modelling evidence suggests we can halt and even reverse habitat loss and deforestation if we take urgent conservation action and change the way we produce and consume food
CENTRALLY, It is about making visible Aboriginal knowledge: Cultures that have known how to exist, as part of and as one with nature in a sustainable way, with a much longer track record of success than the current failing system of value.
Attempting to decolonise our minds and relationships, from the ideologies that build our global unconscious biases. This destructive, unspoken sense of supremacy over nature, animals, plants and of course over historically strategically othered humans, is not benefitting anyone but the usual culprits.
We wish to acknowledge the Butchulla people, the Yugambeh people, the clans that make up the Bundjalung Nations, the Turrbal and Yaggera people, as original custodians of the lands and seas where we often work.
Places where stories, culture and art have been made and shared for millennia. Recognising their ancestors, as well as past, current and future elders; whose sovereign country was never ceded.
Australia always was, and always will be, aboriginal land.