WATERMARK Movie trailer - Plot synopsis: Transporting us all over the world, Watermark reveals the extent to which humanity has shaped water, and how it has shaped us.
Expanding on Burtynsky’s photography, the film uses aerial perspectives to mesmerizing and curiously beautiful effect.
In California, the vast All-American Canal diverts water to urban centres.
In India, the Hindu pilgrimage and festival Kumbh Mela sees 30 million worshippers bathe in the sacred river at Allahabad (Prayagraj) in a single day.
Tributaries of the dried-up Colorado River look like stunning woodcuts of snow-covered trees, while the Xiluodu Dam release in China is reminiscent of 19th-century paintings by J.M.W.
Turner.
Avoiding didacticism, Baichwal and Burtynsky explore humankind’s reverence of water in its natural state, and also the massive impact human intervention has on its life cycles.
Part reverie, part lament, Watermark is a poetic and thought-provoking reflection on this most precious substance.