Anyone who is interested in climate change, global warming, marine life and the extinction of our coral reefs should attend Impact Hub Geneva’s movie screening on September 20th. Shown on a big screen in the Grand Salon, you will have the opportunity to watch “Chasing Coral”: A Sundance awarded documentary released July 14th of this year. Afterwards there will be an opportunity to discuss the movie with the main character: Zack Rago.

Documenting a tragedy

It took the director of the movie: Jeff Orlowski (Chasing Ice) and his team more than three years to shoot the images for the documentary. They were helped in their efforts by over 500 people from various locations around the world. A lot of time, but the end result has proven its impact. The movie received several nominations and won this year’s Sundance Festival Audience Award.

What is it about? By contrasting beautiful underwater scenes of rich and colorful corals with disturbing images of the same coral reefs rapidly being wiped out, the documentary is slowly revealing us how our oceans are changing. Using a time lapse technique the movie provides evidence showing that over the last 30 years the world has lost 50 percent of their corals (see picture on the left).

“Corals are the most sensitive indicators of climate change in the ocean.”

One of the protagonists of the movie, a young diver and so called “coral nerd”, Zack Rago witnessed everything. He spent hours and hours in the water, manually making time laps images to capture everything on camera. Zack will be joining the event via Skype and will be ready to answer any question regarding the documentary.

The idea and program on September 20th

The idea for hosting this event came from Hub Member Eunice Kim and her friend Marina Ruta, an environmentalist and a free diver herself. Eunice: “Marina is a friend of a friend of the director. We wanted to use this connection not only to show the inspiring film in Geneva but also to activate the campaign in our city and to draw local attention to the core issues of climate change and the impact on the eco system. We also invited smaller NGO’s through the Geneva Environmental Network and the Green Community Project for this evening. However, it is going to be an informal event, with the opportunity to network and discuss with each other.”

Another good reason to attend the evening is the opening speech by Swiss Sea Shepherd Advisory Board member Adelin Coigny. Adelin joined the movement in 2013, knows a lot about their campaigns and provides presentations to students to raise awareness about the future of our oceans and how people personally can make a change.

Eunice: “The purpose of the movie is really to raise awareness about climate change and its impact on natural ecosystems including humans. The director has a team and is supporting spinning events throughout the world to increase awareness. I hope we can create some awareness amongst our visitors as well. People can be sceptical in what can we do. But I believe that change comes from very small actions and from the people.”

Interested? Join us on September the 20th at Impact Hub Geneva. Want to know more? Find all details about the event or immediately subscribe here.

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