Pachamama, our dear Mother Earth, is 4.5 billion years old. She is home to an estimated 8.7 million species of life! This wondrous web of relationships is truly a gift to be a part of, and we can thank our growing and evolving Mother Earth for the eyes and mind we have to appreciate our relationship with her. Just think - we evolved to have a form of consciousness that would eventually see that, as Earth is one meta-organism, we are the consciousness of that organism. In the same way that plants are the lungs and ocean currents are like a circulatory system, humans are consciousness!
Earth Day is a great day to contemplate epiphanies like these. But really, every day is a good day to honor the many connections and relationships we have to Papatūānuku, and to remember that we really, truly are not separate from the universe. We are the universe.
While we have people like Rachel Carson, Carl Sagan, Neil deGrasse Tyson and David Suzuki to thank for teaching us the scientific understandings behind this reality, we should also give thanks to our indigenous elders - the oldest wisdom carriers of our human family - for retaining this wisdom so that the cultures who forgot could someday remember. We are still in that process of remembering. And in the spirit of that remembrance, we wanted to put together this list of environmental, eco-conscious documentaries.
45 of them are free to watch online and the rest can be rented for a few dollars. 11 of them can all be watched by becoming a $5 Patron subscriber for a month. Just click the link for each film to watch.
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51 min ·
All our knowledge comes from nature and yet nature is a source of many mysteries.
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109 min ·
Permaculture designer Andrew Faust gives us an inspiring and heady narrative about the evolution of all life and human consciousness on Mother Earth.
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35 min ·
Peter Russell’s award-winning video, based on a live audio-visual presentation in 1983. He explores the idea that the Earth is an integrated, self-regulating living organism and asks what function humanity might have for this planetary...
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102 min ·
While the publication of Rachel Carson's book Silent Spring in 1962 has been cited by many as the dawn of the environmental movement, the celebration of the first Earth Day in 1970 demonstrated to many that the concern over pollution...
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100 min ·
Tawai is a word the nomadic hunter-gatherers of Borneo use to describe the connection they feel to their forest home. In this dreamy, philosophical and sociological look at life, Bruce Parry (of the BBC's Tribe, Amazon & Arctic) embarks...
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80 min ·
This is the film of the century! - Films For Action
When so many are struggling for connection, inspiration and hope, Fantastic Fungi brings us together as interconnected creators of our world. Fantastic Fungi, directed by Louie...
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101 min ·
“Once in a while a film comes along that has profound impact – this is a delicious taste of what can be.” - Polly Higgins
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79 min ·
A Simpler Way follows a community in Australia who came together to explore and demonstrate a simpler way to live in response to global crises. Throughout the year the group built tiny houses, planted veggie gardens, practised simple...
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84 min ·
From Executive Producer Mark Ruffalo comes the world’s first documentary film on the Rights of Nature Movement, a “Paradigm Shifting” story where the 'Rights of Nature' has become 'capitalism’s one true opponent.'
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92 min ·
Humanity is more than ever threatened by its own actions; we hear a lot about the need to minimize footprints and to reduce our impact. But what if our footprints were beneficial? What if we could meet human needs while increasing the...
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55 min ·
Climate change is here. Will we have the wisdom to survive? The film features thought leaders and activists in the realms of science, economics, and spirituality. The focus: how we can live creatively and even joyfully in the face of...
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35 min ·
"When today's stories of crushing greed and endless growth have come to an end, what, then, will be the new stories?"
This film was created as an educational tool that can be used to move us beyond disempowerment, in order to enact...
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53 min ·
Western views and the legal system tend to view nature as property, and as a resource from which wealth is extracted, a commodity whose only value is to provide for human needs. But for millennia indigenous communities have viewed...
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102 min ·
A New Story For Humanity presents a beautifully and sensitively woven tapestry of the rich diversity that is the human family. Featuring interviews on the essential topics of our time: from cosmology to ecology, from ancient wisdom to...
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93 min ·
We are living in exceptional times. Scientists tell us that we have 10 years to change the way we live, avert the depletion of natural resources and the catastrophic evolution of the Earth's climate. The stakes are high for us and our...
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102 min ·
This stunning film takes you on a hypnotic journey, reaching to the past to understand the origins of the catastrophic environmental transitions we now face. Over two years, director Matt Anderson traveled 16,000 miles to document...
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104 min ·
United Natures explores the rights of Mother Earth, environmental philosophy, wisdom, spirituality, and the potential for a neo-indigenous future for humanity.
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40 min ·
THE NATURE OF CITIES follows the journey of Professor Timothy Beatley as he explores urban projects around the world, representing the new green movement that hopes to move our urban environments beyond sustainability to a regenerative...
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88 min ·
Can we imagine a film that would change the way people look at the ocean? Can we explain simply, to everyone, the greatest natural mystery of our planet? And lastly, can we help our children believe in a better and more sustainable...
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61 min ·
Opening with a powerful ‘deep time’ perspective, from the beginning of the Earth to our present moment, BAFTA-winning director Peter Armstrong's new film recognises the fundamental unsustainability of today’s society and dares to ask...
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92 min ·
The Biggest Little Farm chronicles the eight-year quest of John and Molly Chester as they trade city living for 200 acres of barren farmland and a dream to harvest in harmony with nature. Through dogged perseverance and embracing the...
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45 min ·
This is a documentary about getting out into the natural world and learning from the wisdom of land and people - focusing on how rewilding our perception might be the catalyst for the changes we wish to see in the world.
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27 min ·
Gimme Green is a humorous look at the American obsession with the residential lawn and the effects it has on our environment, our wallets and our outlook on life. From the limitless subdivisions of Florida to sod farms in the arid...
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101 min ·
This is a movie about how we have left the natural connection to the planet. The movie investigates how this has happened, the incredible amounts of pollutants that we are exposed to, even as a fetus, and the technology that can help...
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87 min ·
Within Reach explores one couple's pedal-powered search for a place to call home. Mandy and Ryan gave up their jobs, cars, and traditional houses to 'bike-pack' 6500 miles around the USA seeking sustainable community. Rather than...
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52 min ·
When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1990, Cuba's economy went into a tailspin. With imports of oil cut by more than half – and food by 80 percent – people were desperate. This film tells of the hardships and struggles as well as the...
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59 min ·
This film series explores many aspects of our society. To rethink what is possible in our world, we need to consider what kind of world we want to live in. Although we refer to it as civilization, it is anything but civilized. Visions...
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48 min ·
"It's possible to rehabilitate large-scale damaged ecosystems with the use of permaculture design principles and techniques."
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44 min ·
A whirlwind week in Singapore exploring the amazing story of how Singapore came to be one of the most 'biophilic' cities of the world, on the cutting edge of ecocity design and innovation. Did you have any idea?
There has been...
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66 min ·
This film is an inspirational immersion in the Transition movement, gathering stories from around the world of ordinary people doing extraordinary things. There are stories of communities printing their own money, growing food...
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54 min ·
Unwasted presents the alluring ideal of zero waste as a key element of the sustainable business model. While some may shake their heads thinking this an impossible task, it’s worth remembering that mankind had a zero waste lifestyle up...
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56 min ·
Envision a society where economic opportunity, social justice and sustainable culture all spring from environmental stewardship. Imagine a world where nurturing the health of the planet is the catalyst for global financial success and...
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31 min ·
This documentary tells the story of how a national forest service evolved from seeing trees as its primary resource, to seeing the forest whole.
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65 min ·
Economic globalization has led to a massive expansion in the scale and power of big business and banking. It has also worsened nearly every problem we face: fundamentalism and ethnic conflict; climate chaos and species extinction...
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49 min ·
A spiritual journey into the ethereal landscape of Dartmoor with Satish Kumar, the world-renowned ecologist & creator of Resurgence magazine. Through changing seasons, Satish walks the moor and explores ancient woods and rivers, home to...
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53 min ·
Education For a Sustainable Future presents information on how today's practices in schools are socially unsustainable. The documentary film critically analyses what is considered socially relevant in a new education system which brings...
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116 min ·
Occupied Cascadia is a documentary film both journalistic and expressionistic. Exploring the emerging understanding of bioregionalism within the lands and waters of the Northeast Pacific Rim, the filmmakers interweave intimate landscape...
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76 min ·
A small band of natural building enthusiasts and outlaws met in a field over 20 years ago at something they called a ‘colloquium’. The movement they created has grown uncontrollably ever since; reviving and innovating ancient building...
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90 min ·
FIRST EARTH is a documentary about the movement towards a massive paradigm shift for shelter -- building healthy houses in the old ways, out of the very earth itself, and living together like in the old days, by recreating villages. It...
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58 min ·
Using on-site and archival footage to illustrate specialist and eyewitness accounts from around the world, "Scarred Lands & Wounded Lives" shows how war and preparations for war further compromise the environmental health of a planet...
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49 min ·
Man is the only creature that produces landfills. Natural resources are being depleted on a rapid scale while production and consumption are rising in nations like China and India. The waste production world wide is enormous and if we...
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88 min ·
An interactive film about permaculture in the tropics, with education and inspiration as the main threads running through this hour-and-a-half-documentary.
We remind you subtitles are available! Visit http://www.seedsofpermaculture.org...
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62 min ·
Recipe For Change follows the story of Earthship Biotecture in Ushuaia, Argentina as they and a group of academy students build a two-room simple survival Earthship.
Earthships are fully off the grid buildings which catch t
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30 min ·
What If A Solution To Climate Change Was Beneath Your Feet?
Soil is a living universe beneath our feet. As important to our lives as clean air and water, soil also holds a potential solution to the global climate crisis. Increasing...
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73 min ·
"The Superior Human?" systematically challenges the common human belief that humans are superior to all other life forms, which is often used as an excuse for animal cruelty and the destruction of our own environment. It reveals the...
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57 min ·
Allergies, obesity, asthma, diabetes, auto-immune and intestinal disorders are all on the rise, with the incidence of some diseases doubling every ten years. New research points to changes in the ecosystem of microbes that live on and...
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87 min ·
The Kogi are the last surviving civilization from the days of the Inca and Aztec. They see themselves as the spiritual guardians of life on earth. For four centuries they lived in seclusion in the Sierra Nevada mountains, carefully...
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89 min ·
Aluna means "conscience." Enter the last theocratic chiefdom in America, hidden for centuries on a mountain in Colombia. The Kogi have made this amazing documentary to help us understand how to avoid the destruction of the world that...
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120 min ·
“Without question, this is absolutely the best and most creative film on the future of humanity and the environment”. — Paul Hawken
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41 min ·
Throughout history, as entire civilizations have withered and mankind has continued to move at a breathless pace, the trees have remained. For some, these trees harbor the secrets to longevity. For others, they provide clear evidence of...
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30 min ·
Fools & Dreamers: Regenerating a Native Forest is a 30-minute documentary about Hinewai Nature Reserve, on New Zealand’s Banks Peninsula, and its kaitiaki/manager of 30 years, botanist Hugh Wilson. When, in 1987, Hugh let the local...
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47 min ·
Damaging the earth is a crime, right? That is what earth´s lawyer Polly Higgins thinks. Why earth destruction should be seen as a crime and what is it that brings earth lawyers Polly Higgins and Spanish magistrate Baltasar Garzón to...
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95 min ·
An epic, ominous and perhaps life saving radio interview occurs with director, Peter Charles Downey on a small-town country radio station about his new documentary movie, Surviving Earth. Where the trees whisper of humanity’s mass...
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84 min ·
Fermi's Paradox, climate change, capitalism, and collapse are among the subjects discussed in this feature length documentary on the environmental crisis. Interviewees include Bill McKibben, Gary Snyder, Derrick Jensen, Peter D. Ward...
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80 min ·
All over the world species are becoming extinct at an astonishing rate, from 1000 to 10,000 times faster than normal. The loss of biodiversity has become so severe that scientists are calling it a mass extinction event.
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77 min ·
Many people do not realize that permaculture is much more than about growing fruit and vegetables, it is a whole view incorporating the environment, energy, resources, housing, technology, education, healthcare, the arts, spirituality...
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96 min ·
Feeding Ourselves weaves intimate stories from the hopes and convictions of rural BC farmers and producers as they navigate undercurrents of uncertainty with our food system. Their commitment to local food culture inspires us to...
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75 min ·
“The Twelve” tells the story of twelve spiritual Elders from around the globe who gather at the United Nations in New York to create a unique ritual for Humankind and planet Earth. By interviewing each one of them in their home...
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59 min ·
Ladakh, or 'Little Tibet', is a wildly beautiful desert land high in the Western Himalayas. It is a place of few resources and an extreme climate. Yet for more than 1,000 years, it has been home to a thriving culture. Traditions of...
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51 min ·
Cities should be a solution not a problem for human beings. The city of Curitiba has demonstrated for the past 40 years how to transform problems into cost-effective solutions that can be applied in most cities around the world.
A...
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May our love for you, dear mother Earth, give us the courage and strength to protect you, honor you, and defend you from the people who have forgotten their sacred connection to you.
May the day come when all of humanity has remembered this forgotten truth, not through our hopes, but through our actions, guided by our compassion for all beings.