Heatwaves, Riverlandia & Rock Pool

About

Rock Pool: In Rock Pool, we invite the viewer into a space of quiet encounters, one that asks for attention, rewards stillness, and hopefully awakens a sense of awe for the hidden rhythms of the life all around us.

Heatwaves: From the sweltering plains of the Tarai to the crisp air of Nepal’s Himalayas, this ethnographic film follows extreme heat - not the episodic kind that breaks temperature records, but a slow, structuring force that settles into routines and shapes everyday life. We trace it as a relational and material presence, moving through conversations and courtyards, lingering between thermometers and tree shade, stretching across labour and land, shame and architecture, and pulsing through institutional systems and everyday improvisations. We sit with scientists and officials who monitor rising temperatures and issue alerts, and with those whose knowledge emerges from lived experience. Some move between these worlds - translating, mediating, and improvising as they go. We come to understand heat by attuning to the dialogues, materials, and relationships through which it is governed in practice. The film offers glimpses of stories that invite us to reimagine what extreme heat means in everyday life.

Riverlandia: The story of a river valley’s transformation, through the creation of a new wetland, is reimagined through the perspectives of ten fictional characters, most of whom are non-human. Voices include a dragonfly and a beaver, an alder tree and a bullhead fish, a ranger and the river itself, all running in counterpoint with a rich natural soundscape. Alongside the river’s journey, the narrative follows a troubled teenage girl as she finds meaning through her deepening connection with this landscape and the natural world.