Flight of the Butterflies

Flight of the Butterflies is a 2012 Canadian documentary film directed and cowritten by Mike Slee for 3D IMAX, starring Megan Follows, Gordon Pinsent, and Shaun Benson. The film covers Dr. Fred Urquharts nearly 40yearlong scientific investigation into the monarch butterfly Danaus plexippus, tracking the details of what is considered one of the longest known insect migrations the flight of the monarch butterfly from Central Mexico to the United States and Canada and back.

With Mike Slee announced as director, the film went into principal development in February 2007. In August 2007, the U.S. National Science Foundation awarded a three million dollar grant to Canadian Shaftesbury Films and its subsidiary SK Films to both develop the film for the giant screen and create its educational outreach program. The grant amount is the maximum available from the NSF. Filming took place through 2011 and 2012, and tracked the butterflies from their winter habitats in central Mexico to their breeding grounds in the southern United States to their summer habitat in Canada, and their subsequent return to Mexico. In filming the butterflies, director Slee considered using ballons, helicopters, and cables, but ultimately decided on use of a 70foot crane. SK Films announced that principal filming of the oneyear project was completed in early March 2012.The film had its world premiere on September 24, 2012, at the Smithsonians National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C., hosted by the Federal government of Mexico, through the Mexico Tourism Board and the Embassy of Mexico. ........

Source: Wikipedia