Trade Secret
Play Trailer

Trailer

Trade Secret

Trade Secret

Sat
25
Sat 25 Oct 6:00 PM

Odeon Star Semaphore: Cinema 1
General Admission
Unclassified 15+
98 Mins
October
Thu 16 Oct

Sat 25 Oct

Trade Secret is a meticulously composed exposé that investigates how the global trade in polar bear fur continues under the guise of conservation, effectively treating extinction as a business opportunity.

Over six years and across nine countries, Australian filmmaker Abraham Joffe follows a small alliance of legal researchers, environmental advocates and Indigenous voices as they confront an uncomfortable truth; the international regulatory system designed to protect wildlife may be enabling its destruction. With rare access to Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora conferences, luxury auction houses, trophy hunting expos and communities across the Arctic, the film untangles the web of trade law, cultural practice and political inertia that allows vulnerable species to be bought and sold. It presents a chilling case study on how conservation is co-opted by commercial and geopolitical agendas.

Executive produced by Adam McKay, Trade Secret avoids sensationalism in favour of clear-eyed, forensic storytelling. Calm and quietly damning, it compels us to ask whether environmental protection has become just another market strategy.