Antarctica: A Year On Ice

15 July 2014 | 4:20 pm | Matthew Tomich

Antarctica: A Year On Ice will make you want to live there... well for at least a little while.

While most documentaries on Antarctica concentrate on landscape, wildlife and research projects, A Year On Ice hones in on the mundanities of daily life on the unforgiving continent. What emerges is a fascinating portrait of human psychology in isolation.

The characters profiled aren’t scientists but mechanics, administrators and cooks; the people keeping the settlements running year-round. Punctuated by NZ-born director Anthony B Powell’s astounding time-lapse photography, depicting melting glaciers and the gradual freezing of the sea over several weeks, by the end you’ll want to spend a year there yourself.