RELEASE: TV

Australia’s Christmas Island is an isolated tropical island in the open waters of the Indian Ocean.  In this isolated rainforest-covered island, red crabs have multiplied in great numbers.  At the beginning of the rainy season, 50 million of these crabs march from the forest to the beach.  This procession resembles a red carpet moving through the island.  The purpose of this mass exodus is breeding.  Arriving after a long arduous journey, the beach is covered as far as one can see by females with eggs.  Meanwhile, in the ocean the world’s largest fish, a whale shark, lurks hoping to feed on the newly hatched baby crabs!

This episode shows the amazing drama of survival of these crimson-colored crabs.

During summer, the Atlantic coast between northeastern United States and southeastern Canada attracts large sea creatures such as whales, sharks that feed on the dense aggregations of plankton.  To help reveal the secrets of these creatures’ underwater hunting and behavior, the documentary film crew attached special cameras to 13-meter-long basking sharks and to leatherback sea turtles, which as the world’s largest reptile can grow to weigh over one ton.  This episode takes a look at the shadowy lives of these giant creatures as the North American waters change from spring to summer.

The world of paleontology is currently experiencing a golden age: more fossil species have been unearthed in the past decade than in the last two hundred years when this science first emerged.  Thanks to new technologies combining genetics, ethology, geology, and even particle physics, paleontologists can now recreate some of the missing branches from the tree of life.  Assumptions have been shattered and all the rules are changing.

Now, paleontologists can finally answer three vital questions:

– Where do insects come from?
– Where do birds come from?
– Where do mammals come from?

This series, based on ultra-realistic 3D computer graphics, and supported by the world’s leading international scientists will bring these forgotten creatures to the screen and explore the ideological controversies or frauds that accompany their discovery.

March 11 2011, 2:46 pm.  One of the largest earthquakes in Japanese history hits the East of Japan.  A gigantic tsunami caused by this earthquake later triggered a complete power outage at the nuclear power station in Fukushima, which led to three simultaneous meltdowns.  Eighty-eight hours later, on March 15, 7 am, a large amount of radioactive material was released from reactor No.2, resulting in a Level 7 nuclear accident, the highest class.  Five years have passed since the accident, and details of the situation at that time have now emerged through various investigations and exclusive interviews with more than 500 people who were involved.  What actually happened at ground zero?  Through re-enactments and interviews, viewers will witness for the first time the complete picture of the nuclear accident in Fukushima during those fateful first 88 hours.

The BMW i8, a hybrid sports car with gull-wing doors and a carbon fibre body, gives us a glimpse into the future of the world’s biggest premium car manufacturer.

The Bavarian Motor Works started out in 1916 as a small producer of aircraft engines. Yes, its origins lie in the air.  The asset that BMW is best-known for today is actually the last product to be added to its portfolio.  It was only in the 30s that BMW built its first car.  Since then, the company’s 100-year history has seen technological innovations, racing victories and also severe crises. 

The documentary shows exclusive films and documents from the founding years through to the present day – including the story of the Elvis Presley BMW, which has never been shown before.  Historians, contemporary witnesses, race drivers and fans talk about the background and the fascination that have made BMW a global player.

John Stratton is a young American fighter pilot who flies the F-15 Eagle, arguably the most potent and successful fighter plane ever built.  His grandfather was a decorated World War II flying ace, and he intended to follow in his footsteps.

At Red Flag, the international training exercise for air forces of allied countries, many of the world’s best pilots meet for the most challenging flying of their careers.  Red Flag is the final training for pilots and their aircrews before being sent into actual combat.  We follow our young pilot as he makes his way through this extraordinary event held in the desert of Nevada.  He is amazed at how complex, challenging and dangerous the exercises are.

He begins to notice team members who were not a part of his childhood vision of heroism, the support team crucial to a successful mission, and to a safe return home.  In the aerial combat exercises, there are other pilots who aren’t out just to prove themselves, they are helping him — watching his back.  And he is doing the same for them.  He begins to realize that being a hero is not quite as simple as he once might have thought.

Singing lions, bears that waltz, sea lions turning somersaults.  Otters pray, flamingos squawk, a calf who’d rather dance than walk.  Children will want to watch it again and again.  Animalopolis — a giant-screen matinee film for a truly brand new audience.  You’ll like it, too.

With twelve hilarious segments, each featuring a different animal, Animalopolis will stimulate children’s imaginations and curiosity about the creatures they’re seeing.

After 50 years of launching our dreams into space, we’re left with a troubling legacy: a growing ring of orbiting debris that casts a shadow over the future of space exploration.  Space Junk 3D is a visually explosive, sensory expanding voyage into our now-threatened Final Frontier.  Experience mind-boggling collisions, both natural and manmade.  Soar from the stunning depths of Meteor Crater to an unprecedented view of our increasingly crowded orbits — 22,000 miles above Earth.  Join us as the foremost expert, also known as the “Father of Space Junk,” guides us through the challenges we face in protecting them, forging a new age of space discovery.

Rescue plunges audiences into the hard, but inspiring work of saving lives in the face of a natural disaster.  Behind the scenes, the film follows a Canadian naval commander, two pilots, and a volunteer rescue technician as they train for action.  When an earthquake strikes Haiti, creating one of the biggest humanitarian disasters of the century, the audience is swept along, joining with the massive effort that brings military and civilian responders and hardware from around the world.  Rescue is a journey of real-world disaster and emergency response captured (in 3D) with unprecedented scale and impact for the giant screen.

From Earth we cannot look at the Sun with our human eyes.  This 3D Sun odyssey gives audiences a chance to see the Sun up close in startling 3D; stand above the arctic circle and witness the most brilliant auroras on Earth; take a ride on a solar blast from Sun’s surface to Earth’s magnetosphere and come to a deeper understanding of what this vast sea of fire means to life here on Earth.

In the hundred-year-plus history of aviation, truly radical new aircraft designs come along only once in a generation.  Since the introduction of the wide bodies of the late 1960s and early 1970s (followed by the Boeing 777 in 1994), there have been no truly “game changing” new passenger airliner designs until now, with the development of the Airbus A380 and the Boeing 787 Dreamliner.

Through the eyes of chief test pilot Mike Carriker, a legendary contemporary pilot who is flight rated in more than 100 airplanes, we will see how a century of aviation trial and error, and some of the seminal airplanes of the 20th century influenced the design of the Dreamliner.  The audience will be thrilled with the flight of these legendary airplanes in some of the most breathtaking sequences ever seen on giant (IMAX®) theater screens.  Theater-goers will be there for all the important milestones at the dawn of a new era in commercial aviation.  They will see the first public flight of the massive, but super efficient Airbus A380 at the 2007 Paris Air Show and the first flight of the smaller, even more efficient 787, the first-ever carbon fiber airliner that made its maiden flight in 2009.

Legends of Flight will also give audiences an insider’s view of how a modern aircraft is built, and make them privy to the manufacturing challenges and incredible financial risks companies assume when they embark on radical new designs.  In the end, this unique cinematic experience shows how the 787 might affect the next 100 years of aeronautical design.

The mission to protect and defend the world’s oceans has become far more complex and challenging in recent years, and naval aviation has become increasingly vital to success.  One of the greatest engineering feats in naval maritime history, the modern Nimitz-class carrier is a masterpiece of technology, and the flagship of the fleet.  With RIMPAC, the world’s largest and most comprehensive international maritime training exercise providing a stunning visual context for the story, find yourself aboard the USS Ronald Reagan alongside the 5,000 highly skilled sea and air personnel conducting flight operations in the midst of the simulated war exercises taking place there.  Rarely has there been a topic so visually suited and compelling for IMAX® and other giant screen theaters.

Featuring eleven-time world surfing champion Kelly Slater, The Ultimate Wave Tahiti follows a quest to find the perfect wave-riding experience.  The film’s action focuses on Tahiti and the volcanic islands of French Polynesia, home to some of the world’s most challenging surfing and to astounding coral reef ecosystems at the turbulent interface between island and ocean.  The islands are also a homeland of traditional Polynesian seafaring culture and the art of surfing.

With their host, Tahitian surfer Raimana Van Bastolear, Kelly Slater and a group of friends seek out the best waves breaking on the reef at Tahiti’s famed surf site Teahupoo.  Kelly and Raimana share a passion for the waves, but different ideas about what surfing means to them: is it a modern competitive sport or an ancient Polynesian wave-riding art?  As the surf quest unfolds, the film explores the hidden forces at work shaping the waves and the islands that lie in their path.  The great waves arrive and surfing play becomes surfing survival as the riders tackle some of the biggest, heaviest surf on the planet.

NASA’s next era will be its greatest yet.  That is the clear “roadmap” painted by Journey To Space.  The film absolutely annihilates the perception that the space program died with the end of the Space Shuttle Program by showcasing the exciting plans NASA and the space community are working on, and the challenges they must overcome to carry out audacious missions such as landing astronauts on Mars and capturing asteroids.

By using extensive interviews with astronauts Chris Ferguson (Commander of the final shuttle mission) and Serena Aunon (a new astronaut chosen for future flights), Journey To Space gives a sweeping overview of past space accomplishments, current activities and future plans.

Journey To Space puts into historical context the magnificent contributions made by the Space Shuttle program and its intrepid space pioneers.  It uses the most spectacular space footage – including unique views of Earth and operations in space – such as deploying and repairing the Hubble Space Telescope.  It then goes on to show how the Shuttle launched and assembled the International Space Station (ISS).  Together, these programs have taught us how to live, build and conduct science in space.  The ISS will continue operating in space until 2024, and the film shows how it is building a foundation for the next giant leaps into space.

The film concludes with a fascinating, realistic scenario of how astronauts will actually get to Mars, live there for long duration, and then return home after a two-and-a-half-year mission.  This includes the new icons of the next chapter of space exploration:

– Orion is NASA’s first spacecraft designed to carry humans on long-duration deep space exploration missions throughout the solar system.

– Olympus, an inflatable transportation habitat, is an early concept 45- or 50-feet diameter module that would provide astronauts the work area and living space necessary for long-duration missions.  Smaller versions have already flown in space, and a full-scale version is shown undergoing ground testing.

– The Space Launch System (SLS), a new giant rocket, will carry spacecraft, Mars landers and ascent vehicles to place astronauts on the surface of Mars.  SLS will generate over nine million pounds of thrust and will launch hardware into orbit equivalent to the weight of 22 elephants.

Journey To Space will both inspire a new generation of young people to dream of new horizons in space, and engender a new appreciation for the accomplishments of the Space Shuttle Program among an older generation who came to take it for granted.

Journey To Space is co-produced and co-distributed by K2 Films, Inc. and Giant Screen Films and will be released in IMAX(R), Giant Screen and other specialty theaters in 2D and 3D.