Genesis

This IMAX presentation wraps up three years of creaky grade school science in a mere half-hour. The film gorgeously envisions (although in pan-and-scan, rather than widescreen) the “voyage of the continents” from the inceptive supernova blast that created the world through the “echoes of chaos everywhere”–the birth of mankind on the planet. Genesis explores how volcanoes and earthquakes continually reshape the earth’s crust and how, just as humans shed old cells and gain new, our planet goes through through such cataclysmic events. In the search for answers to the unanswerable, Genesis peers at civilizations–such as that of the Minoans, who created the myth of the lost city of Atlantis–that have been destroyed by the “stretch marks of creation” despite their sophistication and adaptability. A dozen schools of thought merge and converge in this attempt to find answers, and the result is a mix of natural science, anthropology, wonder, and beauty that forms a fascinating, provoking look at Earth and how life fits–and resists–its scheme and grand plan. –Paula Nechak

http://www.amazon.ca/Genesis-Billion-Years-Making-Documentary/dp/6305472556