Bali’s inaugural Coral Triangle Film Festival was a huge success! Both tourists and local Indonesians gathered at Desa Seni—an eco-friendly resort in Bali—for the region’s first Coral Triangle Film Festival on June 9th.

Shark Sanctuary was one of three movies shown at the film festival. Each presented a fascinating perspective on the relationship between coastal communities and their marine environment. Several CORAL staff members attended the event, and we really enjoyed discussing the film and shark conservation efforts with the audience members. We also offered guests the opportunity to sponsor shark education materials for Indonesian youth—thanks to the generosity of the audience, CORAL will print an additional 100 shark conservation workbooks ($1 US each) for primary school students in Raja Ampat!

We were also treated to an exclusive discussion with Shawn Heinrichs, the Shark Sanctuary filmmaker. At the end of the movie, Shawn took a few minutes to share behind-the-scenes details of the movie, present a personal plea to conserve sharks, and provide the audience with several tangible conservation actions we could take, such as providing a shark conservation workbook for a child in Raja Ampat.

Stay tuned for more exciting news as our film tours Indonesia and our Sharks for the Future campaign continues to blossom!