According to recent scientific research, more than 450 different kinds of animals engage in homosexual activity. St Thomas Productions has taken this research, and combined it with never-before- seen film footage, to produce this compelling and groundbreaking documentary. Animal Homosexuality explores the various ways homosexuality is expressed in the animal kingdom through courtships, affection, sex, pair-bonding and parenting. A covert revolution has been taking place in nature, and has gone unnoticed until now. With the help of scientific research, international stock footage and location shoots all over the world, Saint Thomas re-examines and revises the fundamental paradigms of nature.
Countries: FR
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Animal Web
Insect societies have always fascinated us by the perfection of their organisation. But without their ability to secrete a substance (wax, glue,…) insects would never have been induced to become organized. The first groupings were enabled by constructive secretions such as silk, a magical fibre that builds, unites, and speaks.Among all the different animal secretions, silk is a formidable medium of information which encourages social interactions. For some species, this extraordinary substance serves as means of both communication, transportation, as well as protection, nourishment, and reproduction. With silk as the foundation, the social life of insects and spiders is organized around these web-networks. Everywhere in nature, spun threads cross, interweave, and separate, creating many intersections where spinner insects and spiders can meet and feel each other’s vibrations.It’s the beginning of a form of communication that can be transformed into a confrontation, a sexual encounter, or another form of interaction. It’s the beginning of a form of communication that can be transformed into a confrontation, a sexual encounter, or another form of interaction. The techniques of macro-cinematography, endoscopy, and electronic microscopy will allow us to forget our giant size and enter into the intimate universe of social insects and spiders to discover the secrets of the silk spinners.
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Langage Animale
Une légende indonésinne raconte que les singes peuvent parler mais qu’ils préfêrent se taire. Les animaux parlent-ils des langues que nous ne comprenons pas? Est-ce simplement parce qu’il nous manqué le bon dictionnaire ou le langage est-il le proper de l’homme au sein du royaume animal? Les oiseaux chantent, les lions rugissent et les chimpanzés –, mais tous ces sons ont-il une signification? Ce documentaire d’une heure nous met à l’écoute de tous les sons produits par les animaux dans la nature et nous fait découvrir le travail de scientifiques qui passent leur temps à essayer d’établir des conversations avec les animaux. Des perroquets en passant par les orques le documentaire cherche à répondre à la question: existe-t-il un langage chez les animaux?
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L’Animale et l’Outil
Des découvertes récentes en éthologie ont permis d’établir que des centaines d’espêces animales utilisent des outils. Les corbeaux de Nouvelle Calédonie, par exemple, se servent de brindilles pour extraire des larves d’insectes de leurs galeries ; les loutres de mer utilisent des pierres plates comme enclumes sur lesquelles elles brisent les coquilles d’oursins et d’ormeaux ; les fourmis couturiêres construisent des nids composés de feuilles cousues les unes aux autres au moyen de fils sécrétés par les larves de l’espêce. Jusqu’à récemment, on a cru qu’il était toutefois possible de différencier l’outil humain de l’outil animal dans la mesure où ce dernier n’est ni transmis ni accumulé. Quelques études sur le long terme de populations animales viennent prouver le contraire : l’outil chez les animaux est aussi culturel, certaines populations de chimpanzés se différencient des autres par leur tradition technique : elles cassent des noix grâce à des pierres. Fort de ces observations, trois questions centrales structurent exhaustivement les perspectives du documentaire : comment l’animal qui utilise l’outil transforme-t-il le monde? Par extension, comment cet animal transforme-t-il les autres ? Et enfin, comment cet animal se transforme-t-il lui-même?
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Jeu Animale
Enfant, le jeu nous en apprend plus sur la vie que n’importe quelle autre activité. Notre capacité à jouer nous permet de devenir des individus coordonnés, adaptables et sociables. Mais nous ne sommes pas les seuls car les animaux aussi jouent. Pendant longtemps, le jeu animal était considéré comme différent du jeu humain mais il n’en est rien. Pourquoi les animaux jouent-ils, quelles sont les fonctions de cette activité souvent dangereuse et qui requiert tant d’énergie. Ce documentaire interdisciplinaire explore les raisons pour lesquelles le jeu est si fondamental dans le développement en décrivant des comportements de jeu chez des animaux aussi différents que les reptiles, les oiseaux et les mammifêres. Il examinera enfin ce qui arrive aux jeunes animaux que l’on empêche de jouer. Tout comme chez les humains, les animaux privés de jeux deviennent des adultes dysfonctionnels et parfois même des tueurs en série.
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Animal Medicine
Like us, animals are exposed to parasites, bacteria and viruses – the germs which cause disease. How do they survive these attacks ? Recent research and observation have shown that animals use plant and insect substances to treat themselves – not only do they apply things to their skin, they actually treat themselves by feeding on things not normally part of their diets. Capuchin monkeys rub citrus fruit on their fur, caterpillars eat poison hemlock, herbivorous red deer have even been seen chewing the legs off live seabirds. This film takes off around the world to discover how animals use medicine, it questions what notions they have about health and how medical knowledge is passed on from one generation to the next. In doing so, the film also asks what we can learn from animals about medicine.
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Adoption
Altruism, an act that bestows a benefit on the recipient while conferring a cost to the actor, is one of the central paradoxes of evolution. In the wild, where only the fittest survive, adopting other animals’ offspring is not really in line with Darwin’s theory of evolution. And yet, amongst bees, dolphins, lions and several primate species, altruism may go as far as adoption. In the case of social insects, parent substitution was a flaw in Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection: the biologist noticed that non-reproductive insects who adopted and helped young ones, brought a large portion of genetic baggage from their parents. Darwin had to broaden his theory to the family group. For mammals, including men, what advantage is there in the act of adoption? In the years following the adoption, does the adopted individual contribute to the foster parents’ survival and vice versa? The controversy at the heart of this documentary continues to be debated in today’s scientific world. While raising these different questions, this documentary will study each case separately because each adoption behaviour has evolved independently forming its own pattern, its own benefit and even…its own disadvantages.
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Language
An Indonesian legend claims that monkeys can speak but they prefer to stay quiet. Do animals have languages that we don’t understand? Is it just a question of getting the right dictionary or is language the one thing that separates humans from the rest of the animal kingdom? Birds sing, lions roar and chimpanzees chatter but do these noises mean anything? This one-hour documentary takes viewers into the wild to listen to nature’s noisemakers and meet some of the scientists who spend their days trying to have conversations with animals. From parrots to killer whales we find out who is saying what to whom and explore whether there is such a thing as animal language.