The Messenger will be screening at the Vic Theatre in Victoria from March 18 to 20, 2016. A special Q&A with David Bradley of Bird Studies Canada will be featured after the film on March 18.
Su Rynard’s wide-ranging and contemplative documentary The Messenger explores our deep-seated connection to birds and warns that the uncertain fate of songbirds might mirror our own.
Moving from the northern reaches of the Boreal Forest to the base of Mount Ararat to the urban streets of New York. The Messenger brings us face-to-face with a remarkable variety of human-made perils that have devastated thrushes, warblers, orioles, tanagers, grosbeaks and many other airborne music-makers. These include hunting, light pollution, high-rise collisions, pipelines, pesticides and loss of migratory habitats.
On one level, The Messenger is the artful story about the mass depletion of songbirds on multiple continents, and those who are working to turn the tide. On another level, The Messenger is a visually stunning emotional journey, one that mixes its elegiac message with hopeful notes and unique glances into the influence of songbirds on our own expressions of the soul. For example, a German composer, DJ and bird-watching enthusiast, Dominik Eulberg incorporates bird-sounds seamlessly into techno music and introduces us to the use of birdsongs in Wagnerian opera.
The Messenger extends our “bird’s-eye view,” with a fresh glimpse into their migratory journeys. As Dr. Martin Wikelski shares the wonders of new satellite technology that tracks individual birds over thousands of miles, and data visualizations elegantly create a glimpse into the otherwise unknown and unseen movements of birds.
We see culture clashes, as in France, where activists run up against hunters of the Ortolan Bunting, an endangered bird that is considered a traditional culinary delicacy. In the vast prairie lands of Saskatchewan, Dr. Christy Morrissey works to unravel the mystery behind the sharp drop in the numbers of farmland birds. She discovers that the smoking gun is likely the same pesticide that is killing honeybees.
We meet passionate and highly motivated people like Michael Mesure, founder of the Fatal Light Awareness Program, who has spearheaded the retro-fit of skyscraper glass with markers, significantly reducing the number of birds that die by colliding with buildings. And there is hope for a sustainable future, as Costa Rican coffee farmers learn from ornithologist Alejandra Martinez-Salinas about the benefits of pesticide-free shade-grown coffee. The diversity of shade trees provide a natural habitat for migratory songbirds and the birds’ appetite for destructive pests provides an alternative to agro-chemicals.
Ultimately, The Messenger is about what the birds have to tell us about the state of our planet and our shared future. In the words of Boreal biologist Erin Bayne, “Could we live without birds? We don’t really know for sure… That’s one of the fundamental concerns when you play with nature, pull one piece out, and maybe that’s a pivotal piece, we just don’t know.”
Check out The Messenger Documentary’s Facebook page for more details at facebook.com/SongbirdSOSfilm.
Other Canadian theatrical dates include:
– Broadway Theatre in Saskatoon – March 16
– Bytowne in Ottawa – March 18 – 21
– Rio Theatre in Vancouver – March 20th
– The Metro Cinema in Edmonton – March 19 – 20
– Cinema Du Parc in Montreal April 11-14
