The Holywood Reporter

 

‘Elements of(f) Balance’ Doc Maker Scouted Earth to Showcase Humans Working as Parts of Nature to Counter “Collective Human Narcissism”

Othmar Schmiderer wanted to avoid "fear-mongering or finger-wagging" but sees a "possible colonization of distant planets as an extension of an imperial lifestyle that has gone unchecked."

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/elements-off-balance-documentary-film-interview-iffr-2026-1236473485/

 

Austrian Films Interview Karin Schiefer

«Forgotten Alliances.»

Still in balance. Off balance. Back in balance. Many elements of our ecosystems are on a knife edge, and future scenarios are bleak. Othmar Schmiderer's attention is devoted to the forces opposing this development. ELEMENTS OF(F) BALANCE explores organisms of resilience, strategies of repair and, above all, the symbiotic connections which have always been employed by nature to ensure its continued existence in a "spirit of we", thus providing a forward-looking model for human interaction with the planet."


Let's start with the title ELEMENTS OF(F) BALANCE and the play on words involving “of balance” and “off balance”. Humanity now finds itself at a tipping point in relation to our ecosystem; did this provide the impetus for the film?

OTHMAR SCHMIDERER: There’s no doubt at all that something has slipped out of balance! There are projects that create a balance, such as the Krameterhof, a permaculture farm in the Austrian Alps, which we show in the film, but on the other hand, a lot of things are becoming imbalanced; we only have to look at climate change. Dystopian visions of the future would have been too easy for us; there are enough films like that... We want to focus on a new awareness, where forgotten alliances are the basis for our interaction with nature. The point is to see nature as a possible game-changer and show how we, as humanity, can shape our uncertain future with it rather than in opposition to it. Our focus is the question: "What can we learn from nature?". We’re still pretty much at the beginning; we don’t know or understand very much. We have reached a really dangerous point where our continued existence on the planet is in doubt. We must finally learn to stop living like looters and instead maintain a symbiotic coexistence with nature. The film focuses on possible alternatives in science, art and design – and also in the DIY sector, where young people in particular are venturing into completely new areas and developing visionary ideas. The cinematic episodes take us to various places on this earth: to breaking points and places of hope in equal measure.


You operate on the interface between old knowledge and high-tech innovation. What’s the rationale here? Can you sum up the important stages of your research and discovery process?

OTHMAR SCHMIDERER: We started researching different ecosystems by wandering halfway around the world in search of sustainability and biodiversity. Intimate knowledge of the workings of the living world is the prerequisite for any form of sustainability. We felt it was important in the film to place traditional empirical knowledge in close juxtaposition with state-of-the-art processes – as a cinematic experimental montage, so to speak. In these future experiential spaces, the relationship between tradition and digital ecomodernity will no longer be either-or: increasingly, it will be both-and. We didn't want a linear narrative form; instead, the film aims to show that the truly exciting "science" and "fiction" has been taking place here on our planet between human and non-human agents for thousands of years. If you’re sawing through the branch you’re sitting on, you need more than just a mental "rethink". There must also be a change in experience and perception, so the environment is perceived not as external but as a cross-species "world of us". ELEMENTS OF(F) BALANCE regards itself as a narrative, depicting spaces of possibility without scaremongering or wagging fingers.


What motivated the dramaturgical transition from the local to the enormous dimensions of projects in China and the Danube Delta?

OTHMAR SCHMIDERER: Even though pollutant emissions in China are still enormously high, China is already a leader in sustainability and will dominate the sector in the coming years. There are spectacular examples which speak for themselves, such as the gigantic reforestation project in the Gobi Desert, which has been under way since the late sixties, and the futuristic dimension of solar energy plants with solar thermal power plants. The speed and extent of sustainability projects being pushed forward in China is impressive. China alone uses more sustainable solar energy than the rest of the world put together. 
The Danube Delta is the largest wetland in Europe, with a whole range of dynamic ecosystems, and alongside the effects of climate change, efforts at rewilding are also evident here. In Ukraine, despite the war, the Soviet-era dams are being opened, so the delta is again flooded more extensively, which halts desertification. In the Romanian area of the delta, where people are struggling with both drought and the decline in fisheries, our attention was focused on sturgeon, a protected species millions of years old; efforts are being made to re-establish the fish throughout the Danube region. 
I believe that when you become involved in this subject, you inevitably move from the micro to the macro cosmos, to comprehend the links between the different aspects. We felt it was important to find a poetic, cinematographic form. Everything is connected to everything else, no matter what the dimension. And perhaps the essential aim of the film is to show that the mechanisms of collaboration in nature which we need so urgently have in fact been in existence since time immemorial. 


You capture visible nature on film – often using drone shots to convey the incredible expanses involved – while at the same time you explore invisible nature in underwater worlds, and in particular with fungi. Were you exploring this opposition to provide a dramaturgical impetus?

OTHMAR SCHMIDERER: Using a drone is a separate issue, and we had a lot of discussions about whether to do so, and if so, how... I think certain landscapes, such as the Danube Delta and the mountain ranges in China, can only be comprehended from above.
In Arthur Summereder, we had a brilliant drone pilot who was ultimately also an editor; he handled this tool with great sensitivity and care. Our aim was, on the one hand, to make the enormous dimensions tangible, but at the same time we wanted to raise awareness of connections with our environment that we have lost. In the case of what might be termed "invisible" worlds, such as those of jellyfish and fungi as ancient life forms, we were initially interested not only in the creatures’ diversity and beauty but also in the fact that they have hardly changed genetically since time immemorial – and they’ve survived all extinction events known to us, from meteor impacts to the last ice age. In contrast to the fragility of human existence, for these resilient organisms, there seems to have always been an "intact" world. It still isn’t possible to predict the mass jellyfish blooms which occur in specific locations by using scientific methods. The erratic way they sometimes appear and disappear has a mysterious quality, almost as if they were creatures from a fantasy film. These ancient sea creatures prefer to dock on the very latest man-made facilities, like oil platforms or plastic waste, for the purpose of reproduction. Fungi were among the first life forms to reappear on contaminated soil after the atom bombs were dropped on Japan, and also after the Chernobyl nuclear disaster: from a human point of view, this is a symbol of survival after disasters. It was exciting to see the enthusiasm displayed by the international research community when conducting basic research in the field of fungi – which may well also prepare the ground for future-oriented applications. These days, in an analogy to the digital branches of the Internet, there is talk of a "wood wide web" among the remaining trees and meadows of this world. 


One of the promising elements in this film relates to fungi; we learn about their benefits and function, and in conversations with experts, you also capture the incredible fascination displayed by these researchers for this cosmos. How did you discover this cosmos of fungi for yourself?

OTHMAR SCHMIDERER: Mycology, research into fungi, has gained considerable attention in recent years, reaching a wider audience with Merlin Sheldrake's bestseller Entangled Life. One of our most important encounters was with the Berlin microbiologist Vera Meyer, who heads the Institute of Microbiology at the Technical University there and is an enthusiastic researcher in this field. I no longer regard it as utopian when she expresses the belief that in ten to fifteen years, houses will be built from fungus. Now it is a matter of willingness and being open to technological progress. Meeting Maurizio Montalti, whose biotech company SQIM uses the intelligence of fungi to produce leather, insulation and building materials, was also important. Innovative people like Montalti are networked worldwide. Mycelium research is a huge field of research. Promising, visionary perspectives are emerging. 


Several of the people you meet also point to sociological parallels in the functioning of fungi ...

OTHMAR SCHMIDERER: These modes of cooperation, transferred from nature to society, could be a model for us. At the moment, we are still dominated by a very narcissistic worldview, which will be our downfall if we continue to act this way. Perhaps now we should look for models in nature. The scientists we talked to certainly practice a different way of thinking and a different way of working. They no longer think only in terms of "me". All these connections result from research into nature, where you see that it can only work if we act together. 


You place an episode from Greek mythology at the beginning of the film – the competition between the weaver Arachne and the goddess Athena. Is this a way of touching on a second thematic arc, which deals with the issue of repair? 

OTHMAR SCHMIDERER: You can see it that way, yes. Threads – torn and reassembled in the case of Athena and Arachne, or employed to find a way through the labyrinth by Ariadne – symbolize fate in Greek mythology: life, orientation and salvation. In today's context, the broken thread could symbolize the fragile web of ecosystems and natural connections that has been permanently damaged by human activity. In this context, the myth underlines the consequences of arrogance and the inability to recognize greater connectedness and symbiotic alliances in nature. Just as Athena, in her initial fury, tears up Arachne's tapestry but allows her to continue weaving as a spider, so we are faced with the task of acknowledging the destruction that has been perpetrated and committing ourselves to repairing and restoring our relationship with the environment. 


Interview: Karin Schiefer
November 2025 

 

At once urgent and meditative, ELEMENTS OF(F) BALANCE offers a survey of the most pressing challenges faced by our planet’s precious and diverse ecosystems alongside the inventive solutions proposed to address them. From the production of biodegradable construction materials made using fungi, the cultivation of plants on floating beds in the lowlands of Bangladesh and the sowing of straw to resist desertification in China, we witness the infinite gifts that the natural world has already bestowed upon us to sustain life. Free of titles that identify nations or names, the film features a cast of scientists and farmers in varied landscapes speaking different languages, proposing a vision of collaboration and innovation that foregrounds humanity instead of borders. In our current climate catastrophe, director Othmar Schmiderer offers a necessary path out of despair, oriented instead towards new ways of living that encourage environmental sustainability over economic growth and mutualism over exploitation. With exquisite, breathtaking scenes across land and water, Schmiderer’s documentary not only provides a glimmer of hope for the future but also serves as a compelling reminder of why this world is worth saving.

(Winnie Wang, Viennale 2025)

 

“God is a jellyfish,” someone once said, referring to the evolutionary finesse of these undoubtedly majestic underwater creatures. If we concur with this bold proposition, then spiritual life on earth must be in good shape. Due to human and, consequently, climatic influences on the marine ecosystem, the jellyfish population has, to say the least, multiplied in recent decades. With 300 specimens (instead of an average of 0.2) per cubic meter of water, their Black Sea numbers reached unimaginable and epidemic proportions a few years ago. The fishermen's nets could no longer cope with the huge amounts of jellyfish and they displaced all other forms of life underwater. Leaving aside the image of brilliantly shimmering divinity, one thing is clear: something is out of balance.

Othmar Schmiderer and his team investigate the ecological fault lines along which, as indicated in the film’s title, the balance of the elements has been disrupted. Or to be more precise, they focus on strategies that seek to reconstitute life on earth in a new (or time-honoured) way. From the conversations we hear, and the images we see through Siri Klug's camera lens, we realise that, like Athena, who – according to legend – severed the thread that once held the world together and then had to tie it back together again, it is becoming urgently necessary for us to reconnect things. Because, this time, it is the human species which is at stake. If we continue to live as we have done up until now, as a scientist in the film claims, we will suffer the same fate as the dinosaurs – and cease to exist.

By prefacing the film with the myth of Athena, Schmiderer and his co-author Stephan Settele at once raise its content to another, cinematic-poetic formal level. Consequently, the camera first plunges us into a foggy landscape which, together with Christian Fennesz's finely constructed soundscapes, blurs into an organic filmic body. When the haze clears, we find ourselves at the Krameterhof in Salzburg, a place where the life of the soil is still intact: 1 billion organisms populate just a handful of earth. Everything that creeps and flies, flora and fauna, all are here. And last but not least, funga, the world of fungi, which has become an increasingly important focus of scientific research in recent years. While, at first glance, life at the Krameterhof seems very back-to-nature, in other places research into reversing destabilisation is very state-of-the-art. So we follow experts from a wide range of disciplines as they harness new building materials (primarily fungus-based), use jellyfish mucus for cosmetics, fertilisers and alternative foods, or employ artificial intelligence to optimise holistic agricultural land use.

As we observe the constant processes of transformation, the camera shifts between close-ups and wide shots: it pans across gigantic fields that blur into structuralist grids when viewed from a drone, or surveys surreal solar power plants that could have derived from Tolkien's fantasy worlds, yet it always remains close to the people, a curious observer and patient listener. Although the dramatic thread eventually spans the entire globe, ELEMENTS OF(F) BALANCE allows its protagonists the time they need to present their points of view, pausing, listening, following trails, and linking perspectives.

It is thanks to Arthur Summereder's precise editing that the different strands eventually take shape in an increasingly clear conclusion: whether in the Romanian Danube Delta, the barren desert expanses of China, the Lungau region of Salzburg or the floating jungle of cuttings in Bangladesh, humans must learn to live and work with nature again, in order to bring about real change. It has always been humans who have interfered, sometimes violently, in the ecosystems and these are now in urgent need of repair. It is not the soil that is bad, but the way it is managed, to paraphrase Sepp Holzer's vivid credo. As a farmer and the manager of the Krameterhof, he is now internationally active in the field of change management. His commitment shows that not everything has to stay the way it has always been.

Despite the increasingly apocalyptic present-day world, these and similar episodes collected in the film give cause for optimism. To date, humans have always found a way out when a supposedly final dead end seemed to have been reached. One thing is certain: nature will find a way – with or without us. The film provides a painful example of this in the Danube Delta, where nature is recovering because there is no time for hunting and fishing, due to the war in Ukraine. When civilisation is preoccupied with itself, the environment breathes a sigh of relief. Where this will lead us and how we will respond is arguably the most pressing question of our time. Despite her optimism, Athena is noticeably concerned: something is out of balance.

(Sebastian Höglinger)