Pascal Sanchez
Documentary, Canada
French with English subtitles
Runtime 99 min.
Director Pascal Sanchez locates an insect crisis of global proportion: bees, indispensable to the balance and continuation of ecosystems, are dying in countless numbers, and nobody knows exactly why. On every continent, beekeepers have seen the collapse of their colonies, a phenomenon that threatens the very foundations of agriculture.
The Ailing Queen follows Anicet Desrochers, a beekeeper in the Laurentian mountains of Quebec, as he spreads the word about his pioneering ecological methods of breeding bees to be naturally resistant to disease. Supplying healthy queens to those in need, Desrochers helps fellow beekeepers restore their colonies and cope with the perplexities of a large-scale crisis of which the public is still largely unaware.
This film won the EcoCamera Award at the 2010 Montreal International Documentary Festival.
The Ailing Queen screens on Sunday, November 13 at 3pm in the Al Whittle Theatre