Bug People

Ants - Nature's Secret Power

January 2004 •English

UNIVERSUM cameraman Wolfgang Thaler and Bert Hoelldobler, a leading authority on ants, bring us face-to-face with the mysterious world of these social insects.

Hatching by Cirque du Soleil

January 2013 •English

A Documentary on the Creation of OVO, by Cirque du Soleil

Microcosmos

September 1996 •French

A documentary of insect life in meadows and ponds, using incredible close-ups, slow motion, and time-lapse photography. It includes bees collecting nectar, ladybugs eating mites, snails mating, spiders wrapping their catch, a scarab beetle relentlessly pushing its ball of dung uphill, endless lines of caterpillars, an underwater spider creating an air bubble to live in, and a mosquito hatching.

Vosička Aphelinus Mali

January 1954 •Czech

The Adventures of a Blue Fly

January 1954 •French

This film was produced as an extension of a research film on the metamorphosis of the fly. It successively shows the hatching of the eggs, the nutrition and growth of the larvae, swarming and underground penetration, the formation of the pupa, metamorphosis and organization of the adult insect.

The Hellstrom Chronicle

May 1971 •English

A scientist explains how the savagery and efficiency of the insect world could result in their taking over the world.

Edwardian Insects on Film

March 2013 •English

In 1908, amateur naturalist and pioneering filmmaker Percy Smith stunned early cinema goers with his footage of the juggling fly. Hailed as the father of Natural History film, Smith was a hugely influential visual pioneer, inventing many techniques that are still used today. Being both a genius and an eccentric, we follow his life from his earliest films, to the collapse of his house from his mould experiment to his ultimate suicide. We also meet Natural History icon Sir David Attenborough, who was so amazed by Smith’s films in the 1930s that they inspired him to get into natural history.

Groenkijkers

December 2023 •Dutch

Story of the Silk Moth

January 1908 •English

I Want to Stay an Ant

July 2015 •Japanese

Satoshi Kuribayashi and his team filmed the insects for over an astonishing 430 days, resulting in breathtaking images and scenes from a still fairly unknown world. Watch a mantis sneak up on its prey and catch it with its razor sharp claws. Experience a deadly, thrilling wasp fight. Sit back and watch the world of the insects unfold before you like you have never experienced it before.

Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo

March 2009 •Japanese

Untangling the web of cultural and historical ties underlying Japan's deep fascination with insects.

Microscopic Mysteries

October 1932 •English

This short film takes a look through a microscope's lens at insect life.

The Marvelous Wild World of the Vegetable Garden

May 2022 •French

This is the story of a vegetable garden, from the first seeds to the harvest. But this garden is different, because here the gardener has decided to banish pesticides and other chemicals, and to be helped only by discreet workers, the insects. As we dive into the heart of this plant kingdom, we discover thousands of tiny lives that organize themselves as in a micro-society: decomposing insects, recyclers, pollinators, the workers of the garden work to maintain a fragile balance within the vegetable garden. As the plants grow and begin to produce their first vegetables, the incredible interactions between insects and plants help protect the future harvest. But it is also their personal stories that punctuate the life of the garden. Between parades, mutual aid and attempted putsch, the story of the vegetable garden thus takes the form of a true nature tale.

The Acrobatic Fly

February 1910 •English

Propped upon the tail-end of a match, a housefly performs astonishing feats, alternately juggling a series of objects - a blade of grass, a cork, a miniature dumbbell… Most extraordinary of all is the sequence in which the fly spins a ball twice its own size, while a second fly perches on top. In the final sequence, the fly repeats some of its earlier tricks while apparently seated on a tiny chair.

Planet Ant: Life Inside The Colony

March 2013 •English

Ant colonies are one of the wonders of nature: complex, organised… and mysterious. This programme reveals the secret, underground world of the ant colony, in a way that’s never been seen before. At its heart is a massive, full-scale ant nest, specially designed and built to allow cameras to see its inner workings. The nest is a new home for a million-strong colony of leafcutter ants from Trinidad. For a month, entomologist Dr George McGavin and leafcutter expert Prof Adam Hart capture every aspect of the life of the colony, using time-lapse cameras, microscopes, microphones and radio tracking technology. The programme explores how these tiny insects can achieve such spectacular feats of collective organisation. It also reveals the workings of one of the most complex and mysterious societies in the natural world – and shows the surprising ways in which ants are helping us solve global problems.

Das große Insektensterben

November 2018 •German

The Gateway Bug

May 2017 •English

Over 2 billion people on earth eat insects for protein. The Gateway Bug explores how changing daily eating habits can feed humanity in an uncertain age, one meal at a time.

True Bug

September 2022 •Finnish

Short documentary about true bugs and humans. Short film is also a compassion practice and small journey from human perspective to other playful ways to see.

The Mystery of Marriage

September 1931 •English

The courtship rituals of animals and plants are compared to those of contemporary society, with educational and frequently humorous results.

Underground Farmers

January 1939 •English

Ages before man proclaimed himself a superior being, the tiny ant had developed the art of agriculture — a practice which was later to be the backbone of human society.