The organism survives only if the surrounding environment favours. But it takes thousands of years of evolution to find its right place. Its existence is only to restore the balance in the nature as much as fast it can. Because the organism moves one place to another and help elements to meet one another which can't do themselves, in a result the reaction happen. The extinction happens when the balance between naturally existing elements and living organism was disturbed. The Earth has seen such five mass extinctions and now on the verge of sixth only because of one species, the man. There's no one in this universe to question his supremacy, but himself in the form of scientists, environmentalist et cetera. This documentary talks one of that small topic, analysing its root cause.

From the Academy Award winning director for the documentary 'The Cove', once again, his focus came to bring the awareness about marine species that disappearing due to excessive hunting. From Japan's dolphin hunt to now the focus is on the Chinese's misbelief that causing animals like tigers, rhinos, marine animals to face the threat.

In this film, the Oceanic Preservation Society followed the source to find how and where it all begins. Since it is related to marine life - shark fin and manta ray gill trade markets were the target. That leads the crew to travel all the way to Indonesia, where a small coastal village is one of the major supplier to the Chinese consumer.

"We have this illusion that it's the big things in the environment that count. But if you lose the small things... Everything else fails."

For the Chinese population density, just think what might cause if they believe in something that is not right. Since the rise of China's middle class, they can offer anything from anywhere in the world. Because of this demand the rich in biodiversity like India, Africa, Indonesia is affected due to poaching and other illegal activities. What they need is proper scientific education about their misbelief. Make the Chinese immigrants to mingle with the rest of the world, not to live and die in their own den called 'China city'.

I am not a Chinese hater, but their misbelief is outrageous, especially for their population strength, it is 5 to 10 times faster than what the rest of the world's misbelief causing threat. Every nation has its own negatives, today it is China, tomorrow it will be India and then United States followed by Europe and Africa. Now it is not only up to the world leaders, but every citizen has to care, even a small contribution means a lot. The recent Paris climate conference has brought only a small halt, especially on the natural resourcing, yet other similar fields have to come into the force in a similar treaty.

The civilisation happened when human thought he does not fit with the natural habitat anymore for his excessive brain power and left it once for all behind other species by creating his own world alongside. Animal and plant farming is the way he discovered to cope with his hunger. But what we don't know is these farming is still occurring on the face of the earth that contributes whatever the changes the planet sees. But that does not it, overpopulation is another bigger issue. There are more consumers than farmers and farm products, thus leading us to go back to wild to hunt which is seriously causing imbalance in chemical and biological world.

"So, this is really the last line of defense, keeping animals that are extinct in the wild in a captive situation."

Focusing on the marine was their prime intention, but the discussion led to many other sub-topics. Unlike the director's previous film, it did not stay on one issue, but kept rotating on the various subjects by revealing the causes and the solution. At some point it lost its track, and started to advertise a fancy stuff. But that is a major way getting the attention of today's people in the digital world. Whatever you might think of me, but the truth is I was heartbroken several times while watching this film and had tears. This film is not a masterpiece, that's why it did not get an Oscars nominee except for an original song, nevertheless the voice it raised against is a true commitment.

Recently I stopped to visit zoos, the place I consider is a prison for animals who have committed no crimes. But in todays world situation, looks like the captive is the final line of defence. If there is a another world, people with much more vigilant about their natural world, I would definitely like to go for it. But earth is what we all have and we're failing to take care, when it comes time to run, you will have no place to go. Just look at the recent reports of pollution in the Chinese cities, it is what I had seen in movies like 'The Mist', 'The Road', is all coming true. The apocalypse is not too far from reality. Like in this film say, it is not too late to join hands for good.

10/10

With nearly half of our wildlife decimated since the 1940s, it's not hard to imagine that the natural world is in some serious trouble. The expansion of the modernized world and the overpopulation of humans has caused nature and its species' to face extinction. "Racing Extinction" is a shred of hope. It sheds light on the important issues facing nature and the thousands of animals facing extinction due to climate change, poaching, pollution, ocean acidification, hunting and fishing, and the destruction of natural habitats. This documentary interviews many knowledgeable conservationists and scientists who have solutions and hope on this subject. With magnificent footage of nature and animals and devastating footage of the destruction of nature, this documentary does a brilliant job blending the beauty and the loss of the natural world with the solutions to preserving it.

This should be a mandatory documentary in schools or on television. Everybody should be obliged to watch Racing Extinction. Not tomorrow but today. Even though I think it is already too late. Not that we could not change everything if everybody would act and think rationally. But that's the problem of our planet. Most people are driven by greed, possession, having everything as fast as possible, mass consumption etc... Nobody seems to care what the future will be for their children. I have none, and will never have any, but I'm still concerned about what we are doing to our planet. We humans are the parasite of the Earth. It could be reversed but I honestly have not much hope. Anyways, watch this, it's sometimes beautiful, sometimes very hard, but it's the truth. I cried like almost a third of the documentary, but it was worth watching it. I can only recommend this highly!

Racing extinction is a documentary about how, human interference have directly or indirectly eliminated most of the species in recent years. It describes at this pace we will be eliminating 50% of the known species by 2050.

The documentary presents us with options how we can deal with this. It shows how mindset of people can be influenced for good and right. It gives us the message of lighting a candle instead cursing the darkness. At the end it is shown how pictures or a film can prove out beneficial in making the role of human to realize their responsibility.

Change is always resisted. People don't like change. We may be fault at many things, but it's never too late to correct ourselves and in this case, it is high time!

An excellent overview of the situation which all inhabitants of the earth are facing. While I didn't much care for the "Save the Whales" mentality which bookends this documentary, I do recognize that this is a point to which the general public can relate.

The core of the issue is found in the middle third of this film: acidification. To summarize; what good is saving whales, dolphins, tuna, or seahorses now if all sea life will be extinct in the 23rd century? Kelp and jellyfish excluded. That is the issue of ocean acidification which excess CO² exacerbates, so watch that portion of this documentary twice. Then perhaps watch a Ted Talk or read a book on this specific subject. I would recommend the talks given by Dr. Alex Cannara; Acidification, Climate & Energy found at youtu(dot)be/rzoW_cVg2hE.

If you don't catch this idea in the film, I'll spell it out here. Plankton (Pteropods) do three things; 1) they absorb CO² and sequester it in their tiny shells which fall to the bottom of the ocean should they not get eaten. 2) Pteropods are sometimes eaten and form the base of the oceanic food chain. Nearly half the human population lives near the ocean and is part of that food chain. 3) As these bit of plankton take in CO² for nourishment, they also give off oxygen. In fact, slightly more than half of all oxygen on Earth is resupplied in this fashion.

Currently Pteropods are already under duress as a species and numbers have begun to dwindle. Extinction in the 23rd century for nearly all invertebrates & vertebrates is looming - and human activities are 99% of the problem. As I wrote above, watch the middle third of this documentary closely. We have a few decades to avoid this extinction scenario. Let's act wisely.

The documentary is excellent. The mentioned the main reason for global warming, however it feels like it is just a mention. It is good in a way. People who pay attention to every word in this documentary, will feel the need to watch more, to get more knowledge. I consider this to be a excellent starting point for someone who is disconnected. Most humans don't make the connection because of the media propaganda. I really like that it doesn't have a lot of graphic content. if you want graphic content and you are ready you can watch Earthlings. The best ideas from this movie is the ways they implement to change the world. There are 2 approaches that changed my hopes when i do activism. I will not spoil the movie for you. i am just going to say the video technique used in the restaurant and then in New York and then the guy who changes a whole town in Mexico business structure for a sustainable new way to earn a living.

Racing Extiction, as the title clearly suggest, is about human activities that started at some point ad have made possible for species thriving for centuries to disappear in just a couple of years.

This film is an eye opening for everyone who is living on this planet.

The crew were not only involved in documenting some serious vile human activities, but they were also involved in more important role like educating people about the consequences of their actions.

Majority of us blame automobiles for the increasing pollution these days, but this film takes you to places where you might question the food we eat: Milk, Cheese, etc.. As shown in the movie, the way we have started consuming dairy products has led to increased demand for them, and in turn, has led to more cows, buffalo which in turn gives out methane, a gas more potent than Carbon Dioxide. Carbon Dioxide can cause serious damage to sea life.

It is sad and overwhelming at some points. But very inspirational. This documentary should be shown in every school and college.

If you haven't seen this film yet, watch it. It will be worth your time and money.

An incredible factual documentary, delving into the destruction that human beings are having on our precious planet.

The documentary is incredibly insightful! The creators have gone to great extent to backup their scientific facts.

This is a stunning documentary that will change the way you view your life and our fragile planet.

Like the documentary Black Fish that had a great effect and change on the way the public perceive animals in captive for human entertainment, Racing Extinction shines the same light but on the world over and the effect mankind is having on it......

THE WORLD MUST SEE THIS FILM 'TODAY'!

Congratulation to the Racing Extinction team and thank you. We need more people like you on this stunning world of ours!

I honestly cant remember when I last reviewed a movie / documentary, however, I fell in love with the message of this documentary. Its a story of whats happening to our planet. What we are doing to our own, our only home. A home we all share with other residents who have been turned into guests & slowly killed off one by one, by us.

Far more entertaining, saddening, thought provoking, guilt triggering & as if knowing our need / desire for a twist at the end, hope bringing & pasting a smile to our face at the end. The message is clear, we have been making mistakes, however, we still have time, together we all can bring a change, a change for happiness & place for every creature on this planet.

And to make the review a bit more personal, I want to share, how its affected me. I love bags, I actually love leather. As a geek, I really really care about my backpacks, shoulder bags etc. I actually have over 20 bags and keep on the lookout for expensive brands, unique designs etc. I have just deleted all the references / link to the sites. I have plenty, its time I used the damn bags, the twenty themselves will last me my lifetime.

Watch this movie, for your own knowledge, for the guests of this planet, for your children. Nevermind, just watch it for yourself.

As we race headlong into our 6th Extinction, we delude ourselves into thinking there's something we can do about it. Kyaktivists are already patting themselves on the back for having "done their part" to keep the Oilygarchy from drilling in the Arctic. Unfortunately, as well-intentioned and as laudable their efforts might be, it's all too little, too late. The REAL reason the Oilygarchy gave up on the notion of drilling for oil in the Arctic was this: as RACING EXTINCTION clearly shows, there's enough Methane frozen in the ice to wipe Mankind off the face of the Earth FOREVER. We see a block of ice being excavated and, within it, a veritable Diorama of Death: Frozen Methane gas (ironically enough, looking not unlike the kind of mushroom cloud one sees when an Atomic Bomb is detonated). Knowing that drilling will unleash enough Methane to kill all Life on this planet, the Oilygarchs backed off- but the Russians HAVEN'T: they fully intend to drill in the Arctic. Of course, it's possible they may decide NOT to drill there... but I wouldn't hold my breath if I were you...

Best documentary video. A must watch movie for all. We people must support to find a true solution for the future which this film show in which level we are living on.

This film gives the message about PAST in our PRESENT to know our FUTURE.

We must Predict, Prevent & Protect (PPP) the nature of the planet. Because our planet's nature so beautiful that we almost scratched to ugly. GOD gave us this Earth beautifully, we turn it to a large mass of garbage. Just TRY to share the message of this film to friends, families & neighbor. Be a part of doing GOOD.

This wild and cleverly produced documentary is going to take you places and bring tears to your eyes - not once, but on several occasions. There's also a scientific twist, offering an intriguing insight as to how Earth's atmosphere and it's oceans have changed over the many millions of years due to biological evolution, natural events, human interference, and what that could mean for the future.

Indeed, there is a strong focus on protecting endangered species both on land and on sea, however don't mistake this for an average "save the whales" documentary where one flicks over the channel when the end credits roll. This documentary will stir up a rather different emotion that presents a sense of empowerment on a level never experienced before.

The build up to the finale was superb; to coin a phrase, "The icing on the cake."

If you have ninety minutes spare to watch Racing Extinction, it will be ninety minutes well spent.

for all the cast; you are one of few respectful unique documentary movie makers. I knew the world it going straight to that dead zone; but I never know it is going with this speed even this acceleration.

but after all I realized that the earth (mother nature) she is not going to die. she will survive. she already survived for millions of years.

she will live, we won't. so I used this as a message subject. the message I sent to almost everyone I know to watch this important movie.

About the movie itself; here is what I think is the tiny bad thing is I felt like you (and I mean who handled the documentation itself) wanted to show too many things in very sort time from my prospective. This movie I think it can be in sequels of at least 5 parts. Of course you delivered the message so perfectly. but it wasn't a full one.

It's easy to act as if climate change and mass extinction are not a Western problem - sadly, this is how this documentary mainly presents these issues to us. Although it touches slightly on the problems caused by the West, it focuses primarily on remote locations and allows the Western audience to sit back and simply observe and say "Hey! That's not right, they shouldn't be selling endangered species as a delicacy!". While of course, this is correct, but by shifting the blame to those in far away places, the audience can find it easy to forget that animal agriculture is the leading cause of species extinction, ocean dead zones, water pollution and habitat destruction. This is briefly mentioned, but the documentary primarily focuses on underprivileged individuals who catch and sell beautiful creatures such as manta rays to the 'exotic food' market - because they have no other source of income.

Although the documentary is carried well, to understand in detail the main cause of mass extinction - follow this up with 'Cowspiracy' - as good as it is, Racing Extinction doesn't pack the same punch as 'The Cove'.

Serious questions were exposed in this documentary, even if they are already known, but two most important one wasn't even made: Do we need to be saved? Are we even trying hard for it? All the questions made on it about our seemingly inevitable extinction, has two common factors: money and humanity. What we do about it? Never seen documented.

The movie is pretty linear and simple, with some groups of activists and they defend different causes in order to one objective in common: a belief that what they do will save mankind. And we travel with them through their works on trying that. The locations and some images are fantastic, with an okay cinematography but a poor editing, IMHO.

Don't get me wrong, I believe in their work. The cruelty with the animals is insane, and it shames me to think we're capable of that (and even more). They do a very good job in the demonization of great companies and the ordinary fisherman who's trying to feed their family, but the message is passed like a religion: "Look what we are doing? Be ashamed of it, hate yourself and get sick of you. But if you want to save this, it'll save mankind, because what we are doing is the way to do it".

I think it's incredible how they make us empathize not only with their cause, but with the animals and specially, the mother nature. Some of them die for the cause, they really believe on it, and it's inspiring. We feel earth's loneliness, pain, despair, anger, sadness. All of this through their words and their emotions, with a very nice work on the soundtrack. But this show, to me, what I think it's a bad thing: some of them look unable to connect with human beings. They just can't.

There are heroes doing an undercover job for the ones who are lazy or don't brave enough to risk everything for it. And they are doing an important job. They are trying to correct things the humanity choose, trying to save us from an almost imminent ending. And they can be right, but they need to remember two questions: Do we need to be saved? Are we even trying hard for it?

this is the best documentary I have seen recently. It is related to every one of us. A message is very effective and depiction is much convincing. Don't waste another second in reading reviews and start watching it right now. It is worth the time. I really appreciate the hard work of the team behind this amazing shoot.

A documentary is supposed to document and inform but this film it is just the opposite of what a documentary should be.

Instead of focusing on one aspect, the documentary goes in circle presenting all the ways we as humans are managing to destroy the Earth's ecosystem. It presents points already made by several other documentaries but without stating anything new.

It presents some valid points about what's wrong with the way we treat animals, and how we have screwed up at a global scale, but when it comes to point fingers at actual people, they prefer to blame some remote village of Indonesia where people hunt manta rays in order to survive as they find it difficult to grow plants in there. The message seems to be: the world is screwed but let's start fixing it by ruining some countryside people's livelihood. Killing manta rays is wrong, they are cute, they are innocent, but leaving people starve and live in poor conditions, that's fine. Who cares?

In the same village, they show these fishermen going out fishing on their little boat, struggling to catch the manta, doing everything with their bare hands, and audience is supposed to feel sad? The commentator even tries to convince us that we should be disgusted by the fact that the fisherman kills the manta by sticking a long knife in its brain. Perhaps, for the wealthy western commentator, it is easier just to walk in the supermarket, buy his plastic-packaged minced meat of an animal that he never saw alive, doesn't know in what miserable conditions it lived and doesn't even know how it was killed. That hunting scene actually just makes one respecting more these fishermen.

Shall we talk about the white guy that saves a poor manta ray caught into a fishnet or something? Oh yes, he is the big hero. So cheesy. Cheesy as the director being interviewed and crying in front of the camera. Actually that's not cheesy, that's just dishonest. I don't doubt that he was crying for real, but you are the director of the film for god sake. You should be honest enough to leave that part out.

Why this kind of activist documentaries are always one sided? They find all the possible western people to interview to support their statement, but they cannot get some Asian experts to stand up for the poor people?

If killing whales and dolphins is wrong, why before traveling to the East, they don't travel within the USA (Alaska for example) or Northern Europe? Perhaps because they speak English, are well educated, and it is going to be more difficult to sell their dishonest activism?

When it comes to criticize the western society, they use some stock footage or they leave it to the commentator to describe how bad the western world is. But when it's about China or Indonesia, they use cheap tricks of hidden cameras to film poor and uneducated people that obviously don't have the ability to defend themselves with words as they are not able to debate and express their point of view with clarity. Why they don't go bother the big western corporations with hidden cameras and annoying interviews?

In fact, why they don't even bother dubbing the interviewed Asian people but leave it to unreadable white subtitles on white background?

Towards the end, the documentary turns out to be just an advertisement campaign for Tesla cars. And be clear, I support Tesla and would love to own one, but it just felt like Tesla came out of the blue. There was no point to put it in the film in my opinion.

Environmental activism is a good thing. Especially with the filmmaking support. But when one does it with intellectual dishonesty, it does more harm than good.

From a very Greenie Point of View. Yes its all correct, Species going Extinct, and yes Humans are the Reason. Its very sad and Stuff... But the core Reason is OVER POPULATION !

When i was born in 1975 the World Population was around 4 Billion. Today (close to 41 Years later) we've reached around 7,3 Billion. In this short amount of Time the Population nearly doubled.

Anybody ever wondered how many Humans actually fit on Planet Earth? And keep in Mind: Space is not the only Unit of measurement. Everybody needs to eat, drink, consumer goods / luxury, living space / shelter.

If only there were ~1 billion people (instead of 7.3 billion) we could eat Shark all day long, and we could drive Tanks & SUVs for Shopping Trips...burning 100 Liters of Fuel a Mile not even putting a Dent in our Environment / Wildlife.

Mankind sealed its fate with irresponsible proliferation...sponsored by the breeding-friendly church next door. Contraception, divorce, same-sex marriage, abortion...all Devils Stuff guys. Breed... BREED People.

The Gravestone on the Human Civilisation will be the Georgia Guidestones, Life however...will never be extinct.

Yes, we probably are in a no way point of return. The changes we did to our world are so deep that now there is no way we can fix it. This documentary does a great job, showing the kind of thing we may probably do and don't realize that we are hurting the ecosystem by financing the black Market of endangered species. Yes, the documentary is not perfect, because forgets the people that survive with that income, the social reality that they aren't worried about. But it shows scientists that do everything they can to save those species, or at least, register them to the future, so we can know how they looked like. Finally, it's a great awareness about our world and it show the reality we didn't see, show us that we need to do more for the world.

This is a nice movie, pleasant for the eyes, but that is about it. It is not a documentary. Yes, the extinction is an issue, no doubt about it. Mentality of humans is a problem.

The movie presents plenty of fairly invalid points, so I will just pick one that is stunningly stupid. The bad fishermen who are living their houses in huts, hunting with bare hand, using wooden boats, consuming nearly no resources at all should be overshadowed by good guys, who are regularly flying around the planet in planes, buying the most advanced technology, spending tons of dollars each year, using all the resources there is? I do not really thing so!

Do you want to save the planet? Good! Stop buying stuff, use less, that is the way! And please, do think!

everyone should watch this film as it shows how critically extinct some of the animals were while some species were really extinct, many animals came ahead of us but we kill them like they were just nothing, a very sad and beautiful documentary, hope everyone could watch this and share this so that all of us could be educated by how critically endangered and important animal species were

"Better to light a candle than to curse the darkness" - John F. Kennedy

The message contained in this documentary is a very important one and it should be watched and understood by as many people as possible. The problem is that the direction of it is kind of dull. It jumps from point to point without much cohesion. It doesn't contain anything you haven't heard before. I found the editing to be a little choppy, cutting off interviews mid-sentence to show us an image then continuing half a minute later. Nitpicky stuff, I know, but they can become distracting.

The more serious issue, for me, is that we have a very good presentation of the problem, but we have very little talk about solutions to the problem other than "don't give in and be hopeful and come help us protest". Which is a good reaction, but not a good solution.

It's more of a sensationalist presentation that will try to sensitize you into action, rather than break down the problem and possible solutions to it. It brings a breath of naive hopefulness with it, accompanied with profound sadness, which make for a good combination.

If you are interested in the more in-depth aspects of environmental dangers we face today, then I suggest you find another documentary to watch, such as The Corporation, Earth, Crude Awakening and others.

I loved it. It was amazing. Thank you for making this.

This is not just a movie but an eye opener. This movie will show just how big of an impact we as man have on the world we live in, slowly and steadily killing its own mother. And for what? to be caught up in our own problems built by the economic system.

This movie need to be seen by people of all ages and needs to be reinforced in educational institutions/ offices/homes/societies so that the future generation knows the importance of co-existence.

IF WE AS HUMANS HAVE HAD SUCH ENORMOUS ,DISASTROUS IMPACT ON THE WORLD WITHOUT EVEN BEING AWARE OF IT. IMAGINE WHAT WE COULD ACHIEVE IN SAVING IT BY JUST TRYING !!....BIT EVERY DAY

Congratulations to the entire crew of RACING EXTINCTION on bringing forth the the voices of the unspoken and I believe we can change as people with the same continued spirit

THE WORLD IS SINGING ARE WE LISTENING ...

This is a must watch for anyone remotely interested in sustainability or other issues related to Global warming and the future. Even if you aren't an environmentally conscious person you should watch it to realize how much the media sways us. (Great documentary-a must watch).