Should scientists intervene when faced with the possibility of species extinction?
This question is at the heart of Extinction Vortex, a new documentary project from Honeyland Oscar-nominated director Lyubomir Stefanov, announced at the Vision du Lille industry pitch forum.
The film centers on Dragan Arsovski, a scientist who has spent years studying turtles on the island of Golem Grad, a remote ecosystem in North Macedonia that is often described as “Europe’s Galapagos.” Alsofsky, who has long been fascinated by the species, began documenting the isolated plateau population and discovered a deeply disturbing pattern: skewed sex ratios caused extreme male aggression and reproductive collapse.
Taking Stefanov’s trademark no-nonsense approach, Stefanov’s film follows Arsofsky and his team over several years as they try to understand what scientists recognize as the “extinction vortex,” the feedback loop in which multiple factors accelerate population decline.
At the center of the vortex are behavioral patterns driven by population imbalance. As male aggression escalates, reproductive function declines, pushing the species toward extinction within a few generations.
“This is a nation filled with fear,” said Maya E. Rudolph, a producer of Louverture films. “Some of the footage is incredibly brutal. You’re basically witnessing a male’s violent sexual behavior towards a female turtle. Identifying the energy of this behavior is really disturbing.”
Stefanov added that the impact is already visible. “All the females observed in the study had damage to their reproductive organs,” he points out.
For Stefanov, the phenomenon extends beyond this isolated ecosystem. “Scientists think that what’s happening in turtle populations could also happen in other species, including perhaps humans,” he says. The film also draws clear parallels to human conflict. “War is also a kind of extinction vortex, a conflict that creates a situation where the population declines.”
Rudolph added that “reproductive violence is used at many levels to control populations and perform a type of population cleansing.”
Shot during seasonal returns to the island, the film captures both the fieldwork and the heated debates among researchers as Arsofsky and his colleagues face the fundamental dilemma of whether intervention is possible or justified in the face of inevitable collapse.
“This is an example of scientists facing extinction in real time,” Rudolph said. “We are balancing the scientific process with the existential black hole of extinction.”
Stefanov said sea turtles’ unusually long lifespans of up to 70 to 80 years allow scientists to observe this process over long periods of time, allowing scientists to collect large amounts of data.
The film goes beyond its immediate subject matter to address broader concerns about the current global climate. “There are implicit parallels with the human world and the mass extinction situation we find ourselves in today,” Rudolph points out. “It brings to mind all the terrible things that are happening in the human world. We live in an era of mass extinction, climate crisis, resource scarcity, and science denialism.”
The filmmakers said the project aims to explore how such crises affect human responses. “By looking at this very small and isolated population, we can learn a lot about how endangered populations behave, and we hope that we can find strategies for hope, ingenuity, and faith in science,” Rudolph added.
The film, which has already filmed two summer seasons, is expected to resume production in the coming months.
With a budget of €500,000, the project has secured around 25% of its financing with support from Louverture Films (The Nickel Boys, Our Land) and Sandbox Films (The Lake, The Fire of Love), and is seeking European co-production partners, soft money and international sales.
For Stefanov, Extinction Vortex is the next chapter in his continued exploration of the relationship between humanity and the natural world, following the global success of Honeyland, which he co-directed with Tamara Kotevska. The film became the first film to be nominated for both the Oscars for Best International Feature Film and Best Documentary.
VdR-Industry was held in Nyon, Switzerland from April 19th to April 22nd in parallel with Visions du Réel. The festival concludes on April 26th.
