Tue, Dec 23, 1997
St. Stephen's Cathedral ranks amongst Austria's most famous cultural monuments. Yet, one would not think of that Cathedral being one of the most astonishing natural areas in Austria. Georg Riha and his film team have explored the Cathedral from its foundations to the top of its 136 meter spire and discovered a true botanical and zoological garden: wild animals, exotic butterflies, kestrels, moss, lichen and even trees.
Thu, Oct 7, 1999
The arid sand deserts of Peru have been preserving mummies and burial artefacts over many millennia. Recent excavations such as the royal burial chambers of Sipán and the 220 mummies found at the Lake of Condors produced a scientific sensation comparable only to the discovery of the Egyptian tombs. Starting out from these finds, the movie goes in hot pursuit of what happens at and around the excavation sites of Peru. On the one hand there's Peruvian archaeologist Sonia Guillen, who has dedicated her life to the proper scientific investigation of her country's heritage. Her efforts are frequently frustrated by grave looters: entire villages make their living by digging up ancient burying places to get at artefacts which earn the huaceros a few dollars but which bring enormous wealth to international smuggling networks. Quite often it is the grave robbers who put scientists on the tracks of new discoveries - yet every devastated site is another irredeemable loss of our heritage. The documentary illuminates the criminal entanglements of the international antique market and follows the famous FBI art cops in reconstructing the spectacular robbery of one of the most precious artpieces of precolumbian history.
Thu, Sep 21, 2000
During the time of the Gondwana subcontinent scientists believe the Amazon river flowed west from central Africa, across South America and into the Pacific. As the Atlantic Ocean formed between the continents and the Andes Mountains rose the Amazon reversed direction to flow east across South America into the new Atlantic ocean as it does today. But the African environment is radically different and the river has dried up making the course of the ancient river difficult to determine. The environmental changes also lead to radically different human cultures in South America and Africa.
Thu, Oct 26, 2000
Grossglockner is Austria's highest peak and the eastern Alps' most impressive summit. Rising to a height of almost 3900 meters, the 'BLACK MOUNTAIN' towers over an Alpine natural paradise, the Hohe Tauern National Park, where ibex and chamoix roam the cliffs, wild flowers grow in amazing profusion and golden eagles soar above the valleys. Using state-of-the-art camera techniques, Georg Riha presents dizzying perspectives of the glaciers, sheer cliffs and steep ravines that shape the face of this rocky giant and continue to attract and challenge a steady stream of mountaineers.