KAMCHATKA BEARS. LIFE BEGINS

In this virtually unnarrated documentary, we follow Eurasia’s largest bears who live in Eastern Russia, on the Kamchatka Peninsula, which is often called a bear paradise. The production team headed there and spent seven months observing and filming hidden secrets the newborn bear cubs’ daily lives throughout their first year on Earth. 

 

‘Kamchatka Bears. Life Begins’ is a movie that differs from the other nature documentary. The film is meditative. Music, the sounds of nature and the absence of a human voice allow the viewer to plunge into the beauty of wild nature, to feel its presence among volcanoes, rivers and wild animals, and experience an important boundary, beyond which a person should not interfere.

IRINA ZHURAVLEVA

 

Irina has been engaged for more than seven years in cultural and media projects concerning a responsible attitude to the environment. Now Irina is working on the second film about old forests and asian black bears. Based in Perm and Moscow, Russia.

 

 

VLADISLAV GRISHIN

 

Vladislav has been engaged into documentary film production since 2000, based in Saint Petersburg, Russia.

• DocPoint — Helsinki Documentary Film Festival, Finland 2018
• DocPoint — Tallinn Documentary Film Festival, Estonia 2018

Modern man has fallen away from nature, and this gap only grows. People are less likely to intersect with wild animals, and if they do, the animals are often seen as either a threat or as objects of gain. This is especially true for large predators, such as the brown bear.

 

Fortunately, there are places on the earth where humans manage to protect them and live with them in real harmony. We want to open the curtain and give an opportunity to quietly observe our neighbours and, in this case, the beginning of a new life, admire the bears themselves, and their home.

 

Our goal is to plunge the audience into an atmosphere of natural balance which still remains in protected areas, evoking a deeper desire to investigate and conserve what we still have. The film showcases the world of nature that lives in line with its laws but is open to those who enter it with respect and knowledge.

DOKer 2018 — Closing Night Film