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FlorentinFilm · Documentary Film

How do yousave a sea?

The Dead Sea is dying - not in a roar, but in a slow, silent retreat.

Independent film80 minutesThe Dead Sea
Scroll
IAbout the film

The Dead Sea is dying. Not in a roar, not in a single dramatic event - but in a slow, silent, relentless retreat. The level drops year after year. The shores vanish. Sinkholes open without warning. Whole areas close to the public. The most iconic sea on Earth is turning into a memory.

How Do You Save a Sea? is an independent, 80-minute documentary set entirely on the Dead Sea. Through three people whose lives are bound to it, the film explores memory, struggle and action.

This is not just a nature film. It's a film about people who refuse to look away - and about the weight of witnessing something irreplaceable as it slowly disappears.

"If we manage to save the sea - will it, and how, save us in return?"

A canyon carved into the receding Dead Sea basin

A landscape rewriting itself - frame by frame, faster than the world will admit.

IIThe people who fight for it

What do you do when something you believe in vanishes before your eyes?

Oded RahavThe Swimmer
01
Oded Rahav
Struggle · Body · Hope

An environmental entrepreneur, activist and long-distance swimmer, founder and leader of the Dead Sea Guardians. Every open-water swim is dedicated to the cause; every entry into the water is a moral statement and a promise to the sea.

He travels the world to instill the sea in people's hearts, raising awareness and funds for this cause. Following a recent joint tour of the sea, the President of Israel granted Oded the patronage of the President's House. Oded is a co-producer in this film.

"I swim in all water conditions to show my appreciation and ensure that we preserve them."
Moshe BerensteinThe Witness
02
Moshe Berenstein
Faith · Nature · Time

By the natural course of his life, Moshe should have been in a yeshiva, studying Torah inside a closed, ordered world. Instead, most of his days are spent in the field - on the Dead Sea. Through the lens he documents it with a quiet obsession: layers of salt, lines of retreat, colors that seem almost unreal, a landscape that never stops changing.

"How long can you document a disappearance - without growing used to it?"
Jackie Ben ZakenThe Captain
03
Jackie Ben Zaken
Silence · Sea · Mission

From his boat he runs awareness voyages - not ordinary tourism, but a journey into a sea vanishing before your eyes. Passengers encounter landscapes, rare geological phenomena, and a reality invisible from the shore.

His mission is clear: everyone who steps off the boat becomes another witness, another messenger.

"Everyone who steps off the boat - becomes another witness."
IIIThe filmmakers

Harel Yana
& Mordechai Malka

FlorentinFilm

After 16 years abroad, we came back to Israel. The first thing we did was drive to the Dead Sea.

What we saw there stunned us: places that were once water are now dry land. The distance to the shore keeps growing, the landscape shifts, and the silence we knew becomes a different kind of silence.

For almost a year we went out into the field - at night, at sunrise, to places almost no one reaches. We returned to the same spots two weeks later, and everything already looked different.

We've seen many films about the Dead Sea. None captured the full picture: the maddening beauty of the disaster, the people who live beside it, and the question that goes silent in every frame.

So we decided to make this film the only way we believe in: independently, with no institutional dependence, no one dictating the story. Only the truth. Only the people who live it.

Mordechai Malka and Harel Yana on a desert road at sunset
Mordechai Malka & Harel YanaOn location · the road to the Dead Sea

"If we manage to save the sea - will it, and how, save us in return?"

IVThe sea, up close

The maddening beauty of a disaster

Salt pools from above
Salt pools · from above
Amber water and red shore
Amber water · the red shore
Salt macro, black and white
Salt · macro
Salt and mineral patterns blooming across the shore, from above
Mineral bloom · the retreating shore
Turquoise Dead Sea shoreline with salt terraces

What happens if a place with no equal on Earth simply disappears?

Photography · Moshe Berenstein

A lone figure on the vast Dead Sea salt flat
The odds

One film.
Against time.

No studio. No institutional backing. No one dictating the story. Just two filmmakers, a camera, and a sea disappearing faster than the world is willing to notice.

It takes everything to hold a mirror up to something this big.

The studio · FlorentinFilm

Fifteen years.
The world's biggest brands.
Now - one sea.

FlorentinFilm is a cinematic production house with more than fifteen years of experience, based in Munich, Germany. We've created work for the largest brands and organizations in the world - and we bring every ounce of that craft, scale and obsession to the story of the Dead Sea.

BMWMercedes-BenzAdidasUEFAGucciAmazon

- and a long line of leading international brands.

Watch our work · @florentinfilm →
VThe numbers

A slow disappearance

No single dramatic event. Just a sea retreating, year after year - measurably, relentlessly. These aren't projections. It is happening right now.

0m
below sea level - the lowest point on Earth
0m / yr
the sea level drops, every single year
0m
the sea level has dropped in the last 35 years
0+
sinkholes formed in recent years, and counting
0%
of the sea's surface has disappeared
0%
of the water is diverted and never reaches the sea
Water level - meters below sea level
1930 → 2025 · the decline is accelerating
-390 -410 -430 1930 2025 -440m · 2025
Surface area - km²
1,050 km² in 1930 → roughly 600 km² today
0
1930
0
today
Sinkholes along the shore
a collapse that feeds on the sea's retreat
0
2005
0
2015
0
2017
0+
2025

Figures: USGS · Geological Survey of Israel · Israel Water Authority · CNN, 2025.

Sinkholes opening across the dried Dead Sea bed, seen from directly above

Seven thousand sinkholes - and counting. Each one a place the water finally gave up.

The collapsing northern basin · from above
VIWhere we stand
0% of the film is already shot

To complete the film, we need:

  • 01A final month of filming on location
  • 02Professional post-production - editing, sound design, color
  • 03Original score and English subtitles
  • 04Festival circuit and international distribution
Campaign progress
$0
raised so far of the $500K required amount · 0%
The campaign starts now. Be the first to step up.

$500K will allow us to produce a high-quality nature film, ensure quality editing, and distribute it to content channels and international festivals.

The Dead Sea shoreline at golden hour
Beyond the film · In partnership with the Dead Sea Guardians

Join the Guardians

The film is the beginning, not the end. Saving the Dead Sea is a fight that outlasts any 80 minutes of footage. Stand with the Dead Sea Guardians - the movement founded by Oded Rahav - and choose how you join the fight.

I
Friend of the Dead Sea
$50 – $500
Become a friend. Every donation counts and carries the story forward.
II
Guardian of the Dead Sea
$1,000 – $10,000
Stand at the forefront of awareness and action for the sea.
III
Defender of the Dead Sea
$25,000 – $75,000
Strengthen and accelerate activities for the sea.
Apex
IV
Visionary
$100,000 +
Leave a legacy and shape the future of the Dead Sea.
Become a Guardian
QR code to donate at deadseaguardians.orgScan to give
By bank transfer · Dead Sea Guardians
Bank Leumi · Branch 954 · Account 55980081
Hadkalim 119, Pardes Hanna, Israel
deadseaguardians.org · Every contribution is another witness.
Salt formations at pink dusk on the Dead Sea
The invitation

Stop -
just before the end

Supporting this film isn't only a budget contribution. It's an act of attention - a commitment to keep the story of the Dead Sea alive before it becomes a story of the past.

The Dead Sea may not vanish tomorrow - but it will never be what it was. This film is an attempt to pause, just before the end, to look clearly at the truth, and to ask whether we still have the will and the power to change course.

Join the journey
FlorentinFilm · To join and for support details