Films – Gaia Speaking

Joanna Macy & The Great Turning

September 5, 2025September 5, 2025 Joanna Tomkins

integrally reproduced from the page: https://www.christopherlandry.com/greatturningfilm

“Arguably the greatest interview of our time with one of the wisest women of our time. Heartbreakingly inspiring, practical and transcendental, transformative words that Joanna Macy has conjoined so beautifully in her life and work.”

— Paul Hawken, author of Natural Capitalism

Joanna Macy and the Great Turning is a short film in which Joanna shares her understanding of these times we live in, when everything we treasure seems to be at risk. The film has screened at film festivals around the world and was featured in the PBS series Natural Heroes.

This is not a film about despair but one about the opportunity we have to come alive to our truest power, to “look straight into the face of our time, which is the biggest gift we can give,” and to participate in the Great Turning.

What is the Great Turning? It is, as Joanna describes it, the shift from the industrial growth society to a life-sustaining civilization. It is, she believes, the third major revolution of human existence, after the agricultural and industrial revolutions. This one, though, has to unfold much more quickly. The good news is that it is, all around the world.

“The most remarkable feature of this historical moment on Earth,” says Joanna, “Is not that we are on the way to destroying the world — we’ve actually been on the way for quite a while. It is that we are beginning to wake up, as from a millennia-long sleep, to a whole new relationship to our world, to ourselves and each other.”

This is a thoughtful, and ultimately hopeful, film for anyone concerned about the future of life on the planet.

“We imagine they’ll look back at us,” Joanna says, referring to future generations, “Living in these early years of the third millennium, and say, ‘Oh, those ancestors. They were taking part in the Great Turning.’”

Tara Brach, author of Radical Acceptance, says, “This beautiful, wise and evocative film captures the crisis and possibility of our times. The Great Turning is a global awakening to the dis-ease of our planet, our love of life and the revolution that can heal our world. Please watch this, share with all you know, and allow the inspiration and hope to fill your heart. “

ABOUT JOANNA MACY

Eco-philosopher Joanna Macy, PhD is a scholar of Buddhism, general systems theory, and deep ecology. A respected voice in the movements for peace, justice, and ecology, she interweaves her scholarship with five decades of activism. As the root teacher of the Work That Reconnects, she has created a ground-breaking theoretical framework for personal and social change, as well as a powerful workshop methodology for its application.

Many thousands of people around the world have participated in Joanna’s workshops and trainings. Her group methods have been adopted and adapted widely in classrooms, congregations, and grassroots organizing. Her work helps people transform despair and apathy, in the face of overwhelming social and ecological crises, into constructive, collaborative action. It brings a new way of seeing the world, as our larger living body, freeing us from the assumptions and attitudes that now threaten the continuity of life on Earth.

Joanna Macy has inspired thousands of people around the world who teach others about the Great Turning. You can find a lot of great resources at Joanna’s website, including all her books, and connect with others on The Work That Reconnects Facebook page.

HOW TO WATCH

Individuals and small groups can watch the film for free below. Institutions can purchase the film through the The Video Project. Questions about film festivals, streaming, and other uses can be sent to Chris Landry.

Films, Organisations, Resources & Networks, Uncategorized

Films that Reconnect: “Mother Nature in the Boardroom”

October 3, 2024October 3, 2024 Joanna Tomkins

Sea Change Project’s latest short film Mother Nature in the Boardroom, narrated by Craig Foster and featuring Dr Jane Goodall, has an urgent message for decision makers: provide a seat at your boardroom table for Mother Nature. Include her voice in every choice you make. Listen to her warnings and wisdom and join the drive to give her the best chance possible by prioritising biodiversity – the thing upon which all life depends.

“Storytelling for Nature Protection”, an introduction to Sea Change Project by its founders.

Sea Change Project is a nonprofit environmental storytelling organisation, founded by Craig Foster and Ross Frylinck in 2012. We are a team of media and science professionals who are dedicated to the wild and specifically the Great African Seaforest. Our work includes films, books, exhibitions, education, and marine biology research.

Inspired by nature, informed by science and guided by indigenous wisdom. We aim to build a deeper connection between humans and the natural world by telling stories, through the use of world-class media, that generate a deep desire in people across the world to engage with, conserve and protect nature.

Our Oscar and Bafta winning film My Octopus Teacher has championed a global movement of emotional ecology.

Our work is based on our connection to the Great African Seaforest. We set out to make the kelp forests of Southern Africa a global icon by giving them a collective identity: the Great African Seaforest. We carefully embedded this brand in all our media work and in 2021 it was named a New World Wonder. This newfound iconic status will help ensure its long-term protection.

The Great African Seaforest is a deep source of inspiration for our minds, hearts and souls. By sharing these experiences with the world, we hope to inspire a global movement of nature connection and more stories about the intrinsic relationship between humans and the living planet.

You can read more about Sea Change Project here.

And hereunder is another beautiful piece of videography by Craig Foster from 2023. Thank you for all your contributions towards a future Life Sustaining Society.

Articles, Events & Reviews, Films, Resources & Networks

Films that Reconnect: “In Death is Life”

August 3, 2023August 4, 2023 Joanna Tomkins

I enjoyed reading this editorial that I received in my email… And watching this short film about the incredible Irish peat, by the winners of Waterbear’s prize this year.

The young winner duo Swantje Furtak and Frankie Turk are committed educating people about the importance of wetlands through their activist work at RE-PEAT, a youth-led collective that pushes for a future where peatlands are protected. Kudos.

Hereunder is an introduction to the beautiful work by S. Furtak and F. Turk :

Peatlands are some of our oldest living ecosystems, forming and surviving for tens of thousands of years. Many have existed back when our human ancestors were only toying with early agriculture, when we first started forming towns and cities, and – more recently – when we started radically altering our global climate and ecology. Composed of semi-decomposed plant matter (peat) preserved in water, peatlands are like capsules of deep time.

“In Death Is Life” is a short documentary about a community in rural Ireland with a long history tied to their peatland ecosystems. For generations draining and cutting the peatland was part of their local culture. Traditionally, the peat (or “turf”) was cut in the early summer, dried outside and burned as fuel in the cold winter months. This cheap and accessible material also powered their struggle for Independence during Ireland’s colonial rule. However, starting in the 1700s, through a rapid industrialisation process turf cutting became mechanised and happened at a much larger scale.

In a healthy state, peatlands are the planet’s largest terrestrial carbon store (holding twice as much carbon as all the world’s forests), they are hotspots of biodiversity, and have the capability to slow us down.

These unique traits drove us, Swantje Furtak (24) and Frankie Turk (27) to tell the story of the peatlands in Ireland. Coming from different paths, we have both sunken deeply into the topic of peatlands. In a long call in 2021, we started dreaming of the idea to create a documentary series. We started to collect stories of peatland communities across the world – Ireland, the Congo, Latvia, Germany and Indonesia.

Nearly every country on the globe has peatlands, in different shapes, colours and histories. You probably have a peatland near you! And it is like Tommy said: If you allow the peatland to slow you down, it can change your time.