Oil in Our Creeks

Lessi Phillips was just 16 when a Shell oil pipeline that ran under the creeks of the Niger Delta and her town of Bodo City, Nigeria, exploded. The burst lasted for 77 days, devastating the diverse ecosystem and destroying local fisheries and farms. Nearly ten years later, Lessi has graduated from university and returns to Bodo City, where she shows us the impact of the environmental devastation and the work she does with young women to revive hope in the community’s journey to recovery.

In this immersive film by Contrast, experience 180° of intense landscape shots from the present showing the effects of the oil spill, fused with 180° of animation to show how the community appeared before the spill, for a full 360° of immersion. Oil in Our Creeks surrounds viewers with that past, present, and future of a community grappling with the very local impact of the global oil trade.