Thanks to new excavations in Mauritius and Madagascar, as well as archival and museum research in France, Spain, England and Canada, a group of international scholars paint a new portrait of the world of piracy in the Indian Ocean.
The White Planet or in French, La Planète Blanche, is a 2006 documentary about the wildlife of the Arctic. It shows interactions between marine animals, birds and land animals, especially the polar bear, over a one year period. The fragility of the Arctic is hinted at as a reason to prevent climate change. It was nominated for the Documentary category in the 27th Genie Awards in 2007.
In Israel, a joint French-Israeli scientific mission is set to unearth the secrets of the hill of Kiryath-Jearim (or Kiryat Ya’arim), converted to the site of a Catholic convent, where, according to the Bible, the Ark of the Covenant was kept for at least twenty years before being brought to Jerusalem by King David, father of King Solomon, who would eventually build the Holy of Holies inside the First Temple to house it.
Two young Nicaraguan children, Saslaya and her mute brother Dario, must travel to Costa Rica to find their long-lost mother.
A short distance from Marseille, at Cape Morgiou, in the depths of the Calanques massif, lies the Cosquer cave, discovered only about thirty years ago by a diver, Henri Cosquer. With its bestiary of hundreds of paintings and engravings - horses, bison, jellyfish, penguins - the only underwater decorated cave in the world allows us to learn a little more about Mediterranean societies 30,000 years ago. Today, threatened by rising water levels accelerated by global warming, this jewel of the Upper Paleolithic is in danger of being swallowed up. To save the cave from disappearing, the Ministry of Culture has chosen to digitize it. From this virtual duplicate, a replica has been made on the surface to offer the public a reconstruction that allows them to admire these masterpieces.
Georges Remi, known as Hergé, a complex and complicated artist, created Tintin, one of the most famous characters in the world. With exceptional access to the archives of Studios Hergé and Moulinsart, this documentary looks at Remi's life and the way he changed the art of comic.
Based on the latest technological and scientific advances, this documentary explores the palace's architectural past to resurrect Louis XIV's vanished Versailles. Versailles was an ongoing building site at the time of Louis XIV and continued to be transformed by its successive occupants later on. The Versailles we know today only vaguely resembles the Versailles of the Sun King. Most of its original features and apartments no longer exist. Thanks to the digitisation of thousands of plans, a team of scientists takes us back in time to explore this forgotten past in a new way, through a large-scale reconstruction project to bring back the Versailles of Louis XIV as he designed it, according to his requirements and dreams.
Documentary about the 1759 Battle of the Plains of Abraham in Quebec, part of the Seven Years War between Britain and France. Both leaders, Wolfe and Montcalm, died in the battle, which decided control over what would become Canada. Includes re-enactments of the battle and the personalities of the two commanders. For two months Montcalm and Quebec City endured English bombardments. However, in what the documentary describes as an exceptionally well planned operation during the night of September 12th, Wolfe got 4500 men and two cannons up L’Anse-au-Foulon cliffs to the Plains of Abraham. Montcalm, who never commanded an army before being posted to New France, chose to leave the city walls and try to fight a linear battle against a better trained army.
A documentary about the statue Winged Victory of Samothrace, unquestionably one of the most complete expressions of Hellenistic sculpture
What started as a simple tomb became over a 2,000 years history the universal seat of Christendom and is today one of the most visited museum in the world with invaluable collections of Arts, Manuscripts, Maps. Using spectacular 3D modelisation and CGI to give viewers as never before a true understanding of the history of this architectural masterpiece and its extensions, the film will also use animation to tell relevant historical events. This heritage site reveals new untold secrets with the help of historians deciphering the Vatican’s rich archives and manuscripts collection and following the restorations at work (newly discovered frescoes by Raphael) and recent excavations. A story where Religion, Politics, Arts and Science meet to assert religious authority and serve as a spiritual benchmark.
Combining real footage, archival footage, fiction and 3D modeling, this unseen documentary traces the history of this spectacular and unfinished work.
April 15, 1874, boulevard des Capucines, Paris: a group of young feverish painters shunned by the official Salon and mocked by the classical masters, chose to come together to exhibit their paintings freely, in the studio of photographer Nadar. At the end of a teeming century, when modernity was emerging, this group of rebellious artists, revolutionized the world of art.
After decades of inaccessibility due to unrest and wars, teams of archaeologists from around the globe return to the greatest sites in Mesopotamia in a bid to save what can still be saved.
The Scythians, skilled horsemen and nomadic conquerors, built a feared empire in the vast Eurasian steppe between the 9th and 3rd centuries B.C. All that remains are their graves: the Kourganes. In April 1999, a 2400 year-old Scythian tomb was discovered in Kazakhstan. It contained, among other treasures, twelve horses completely harnessed in gold, suggesting high social status.
