The Land Bridge
Documentary
In this engaging film, experts wind the clock back 40,000 years to investigate the ancient landscape and deep human history of the Bass Strait land bridge.
Synopsis
This documentary takes us on a journey from the Bass Strait seafloor which was once a vast grassy plain on which people, animals and plants lived, to the islands and coastal places of the Bass Strait which were once hilltops of a now-submerged ice age landscape.
Through the perspectives of marine scientists, wildlife biologists, paleoecologists, Country rangers and cultural custodians, the film explores what we know of the ancient Bassian Plain, how we know it, and how First Peoples remain culturally connected to those long past times.
Between about 43,000 and about 14,000 years ago, during the last ice age when sea-levels were lower, a land bridge connected Lutruwita/Tasmania to mainland Australia.
The land bridge now lies 60 metres under the notoriously treacherous sea waters of the Bass Strait in southeastern Australia.
Cultural knowledge and song lines connected to the land bridge are held within First Nations communities.
Today, First Nations custodians and multi-disciplinary teams of researchers are working to understand this deep past.
As the world grapples with climate change, warming oceans, and associated sea level rise, this film reminds us how much we can learn from our deep human story.
How to screen the film
The film is freely available to screen and share via the Land Bridge documentary on Vimeo.
If you would like a screening copy to screen or project at a non-commercial community event in a cinema, theatre or hall, please contact the producers.
Film information
Title: The Land Bridge
Year Produced: 2024
Runtime: 24 minutes
Country: Australia
Type: Documentary
Genre: Science & Nature, History, First Nations
Production Company: Wind & Sky Productions
Director: Jary Nemo
Producers: Jary Nemo & Lucinda Horrocks
Writer: Jary Nemo
Featuring: Colin J Hughes, Buck (Brendan) Brown, Simon Haberle, Chris Johnson, Fiona Maher, Neville Barrett, Madeleine Bessell-Koprek, Wayne Thorpe, and the voice of Jillian Mundy.

Copyright information
This film has been released under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) licence.
You are free to share, show and screen the film for non-commercial and educational purposes so long as you do not modify, remix or adapt the work.
For more information about the CC-BY-NC-ND licence visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/deed
Copyright © Wind & Sky Productions 2024