This distinction marks an important recognition for a film that once again brings to the forefront the most critical issue of our time: the climate crisis — at a moment when the ambitious commitments of world leaders have faded, lost amid wars and economic uncertainty, and when “energy security” has become the new global doctrine.
Filmed in the Arctic, Mankind’s Folly follows two people on opposite sides of the Bering Strait: Nikita, in Eastern Siberia, and Martha, in Northern Alaska — both witnessing their world collapse as the permafrost, the ground that has remained frozen for millennia and sealed in the era of the mammoths, now thaws rapidly destabilizing not only their homes and lives but the entire planet.
At the same time, Russian and American oil companies, rapidly expanding their operations in the Arctic, are installing special devices beneath their facilities in an attempt to keep the permafrost frozen and firm enough to sustain the very activities responsible for melting it. The viewer is invited to reflect on this Kafkaesque paradox — a planetary-scale disaster and, ultimately, the very system upon which our societies are built.
“This award belongs to everyone who contributed to telling this story. It is a film about what we knew, what we ignored, and what we now face as humankind,” said Yorgos Avgeropoulos.
