If Greenland’s ice sheet were to melt entirely, global sea levels would rise by seven meters—an outcome that would dramatically affect coastlines and societies around the world. A long-lost sediment core recovered from a secret Cold War-era U.S. military camp in Greenland, revealed 400,000-year-old plant and insect remains—compelling evidence that Greenland was once ice-free. The Memory of Darkness, Light, and Ice is an award-winning documentary that follows the rediscovery of this core and the revolutionary climate science it inspires. By unlocking the past, scientists uncover urgent clues about our future.

Eunice Foote, a female scientist in 1856 presented evidence that carbon dioxide could warm Earth’s atmosphere—an insight largely dismissed. The film draws a line from her early warnings to today’s cutting-edge research as scientists reconstruct an ancient, greener Greenland when atmospheric CO₂ was half of today’s levels. Through innovative methods—from cosmic ray exposure dating to forensic botany and chemical analysis of ancient leaf waxes—researchers now know the Greenland Ice Sheet has collapsed before and their findings show it is on track to melt again.

As some continue to deny or delay action, others—like the insurance industry—are already adapting, using climate models to assess risk, cancel policies, and shake the foundations of housing markets. CO₂ emissions pose a massive economic and social risk, not in the future, but today.

Directed by scientist-filmmaker Kathy Kasic, the film serves as both a scientific revelation and a call for urgent climate action.

Streaming on Arte & iTunes in October 2025

SCREENINGS & AWARDS

• Wild and Scenic Film Festival
  Award for Environmental Filmmaking

• American Association for the Advancement of Science 

• Raw Science Film Festival Award, NYC, New York
  Best Professional Feature Documentary

• The Crest Theatre, Sacramento

• Santiago Wild Film Festival

• US Capitol Visitor’s Center
  North Congressional Meeting Room

• NYU – Tisch School of the Arts

• Bozeman Doc Series - Emerson Center for the Arts and Culture

• The National Greenland Ice Sheet Science Conference
  Niehls Bohr Institute

• Science New Wave Labocine Online Screening

• Columbia University

• Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory

• California Capitol International Documentary Film Festival

• Universidad La Católica de Chile

• ULB Brussels

• Santiago Wild Film Festival

• University of Vermont

• Middlebury

• Utah State University

• University of Connecticut