Night in the Forest

Directors: Clemens Keck, Tom Horak

In their debut film, young filmmakers Clemens Keck and Tom Horak use evocative imagery to depict life in a local spruce forest at night. They showcase the animals’ remarkable adaptations to the darkness. The film describes what the Tengmalm’s owl, yellow-necked mouse, black woodpecker and forest ant have in common, and shows how these nocturnal animals cope with the transition from the longest to the shortest night of the year. Whilst humans often avoid the dark forest, the forest dwellers are perfectly adapted to the darkness: they communicate with sounds, navigate using ultrasound, and their large eyes help them find their way through the thicket of trees.