The Polar Explorer

Interview by Lynn Hasselberger

The Polar Explorer – The Official COP16 Film by award-winning documentary filmmaker Mark Terry – premieres March 15,2011 at the Canadian Embassy in Washington, DC. It’s a film you won’t want to miss.

What is COP16? The sixteenth Conference of the Parties (COP) as part of The United Nations Climate Change Conference which took place in Cancun, Mexico, 29 November to 10 December 2010 (more information can be found at the end of this article).

About the Film

The Polar Explorer is a complete scientific profile of our rapidly changing Polar Regions. Showcasing the latest climate change discoveries being made in the Arctic and Antarctic–including new life on the ocean seabed and other previously inaccessible areas of the Arctic seas–the documentary film represents years of study and exploration. Following a historic journey featuring the work of 10 of the world’s foremost polar scientists who spent 2 weeks crossing the Arctic, the film compares and contrasts their finding with the latest studies being conducted at the other end of the earth – Antarctica. From polar bears and penguins, The Polar Explorer provides an up-to-the minute status report on earth’s polar extremes.

To purchase tickets to the World Premiere, visit eventbrite.com.

If you’d like to sponsor this film (your logo appears on credits and on film’s website), please email: info@myEARTH360.com.

A Brief Chat with Filmmaker Mark Terry

Mark was kind enough to take time out of his tremendously busy schedule to answer some questions about his crew’s October 2010 expedition across The Northwest Passage to the most remote and mysterious parts of our planet: the Polar Regions.

How did The Polar Explorer get chosen to screen at the COP16 conference?

Our film was chosen because it provides this information at its most current and also because The Antarctica Challenge made such an impact last year in Copenhagen.

What did your film accomplish at COP16?

Our film reached and moved many negotiators and in the end the resolution we were lobbying for – a call to action to build flood defenses and relocate vulnerable coastal communities in anticipation of rising sea levels caused by glacier retreat – did not come to pass, but we did see a resolution recognizing the link between rising sea levels and glacier retreat which was never there before.

You can read the resolution on our website Home Page: http://www.polarexplorerfilm.com/

Why should people see your film? What do you want them to walk away with?

People should see our film for two reasons: to see the latest scientific discoveries made in the polar regions relating to climate change and to see how a small group of people and one film actually achieved a major step in the battle against climate change. For all those who think: What can one person do? This film will provide the motivation that one person can make a difference.