Thin Ice secures United States television deal

20 May 2015

Thin Ice secures United States television deal

Thin Ice, the award-winning documentary about global warming made in collaboration with Victoria University of Wellington, will air on public television stations across the United States later this year to coincide with international debate around emissions reduction.

Thin Ice—the Inside Story of Climate Science was produced by DOX Productions in London in collaboration with Victoria University and Oxford University. A successful crowd-funding campaign held last year by Victoria raised funds to create a shorter, television-friendly version of the film. That has resulted in an hour-long version of the documentary being accepted by American Public Television (APT), which will distribute it to more than 90 stations across 40 states. The filmmakers have also reached an agreement with the distributor's international sales division, APT Worldwide, to licence and market the film internationally.

APT will release the film from July 1, 2015. One of the film’s executive producers, Emeritus Professor Peter Barrett from the Antarctic Research Centre at Victoria University, says the timing is excellent. “Thin Ice will be screening in the crucial months before the culmination of efforts toward a global emissions reduction agreement in the 2015 Paris Climate Conference in December. The film allows ordinary people around the world to meet leading climate scientists and find out why we need to aim for zero carbon emissions.”

The Thin Ice project began in 2006 in response to climate sceptics. The film follows Simon Lamb, an associate professor in Victoria’s School of Geography, Environment and Earth Sciences and co-director/photographer, on his personal journey of discovery as he meets and interviews 40 scientists working on the front line of climate change research in the Arctic, Antarctic, Southern Ocean, New Zealand, Europe and the United States.

Dr. Lamb says he’s delighted to see the film picked up by APT. “It’s crucially important to me that the messages in Thin Ice reach as many people as possible—this agreement means it will potentially be seen by a very wide audience.”

DOX Productions’ David Sington, who produced and co-directed the film, says it’s not often a film of this nature makes it to television screens. “It’s unusual for US television audiences to hear about climate science from the scientists themselves, so we’re thrilled that Thin Ice will be broadcast there.”

Thin Ice was presented to American Public Television by Stan Marvin, program manager for KRCB North Bay Public Media in California, at the suggestion of distributor Green Planet Films. Director Suzanne Harle says: "With the upcoming climate conference in Paris, Thin Ice will be of great interest to public television station managers across the US to programme for their audiences".

Since its launch in 2013, the full version of Thin Ice has been released on DVD with subtitles in six languages making it viewable by half of the world’s population. The film has also been shown at a number of film festivals and has picked up several awards, including the Audience Favourite at Princeton.

For more information on the Thin Ice project visit: http://thiniceclimate.org/

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