The Vanishing of the Bees is the most important documentary since An Inconvenient Truth. The message is crucial: the bees are a pivotal part of our food chain. No bees, no pollination, no food. Although it might seem like another apocalyptic sensation designed to create nightmares about which we can do nothing, The Vanishing of the Bees is, justly, as grave as its diagnosis. The bees' startling disappearance, well documented in the news, isn't caused by mobile phone emanations. In fact, as the documentary slowly explains, the issue is diabolically complicated. What happens to humanity is happening to bees first; they are the canary in the coal mine.
The result of a two-year investigation into Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD), the film features activists, beekeepers and industry spokesmen, including the passionate, homespun David Hackenberg, Pennsylvania beekeeper and the 'poster boy' of CCD awareness. American co-directors Langworthy and Henein gently and poignantly wade into the deep, complex problem - part of which includes industrial farming, the effects of which require the queen bee to be "knocked out then knocked up" in a lab. 
Following the releases of The Cove, The End of the Line, An Inconvenient Truth, Big River Man and other environmentally-aware documentaries, the risk is that this new film's audience may already be weary of doom and gloom. The annihilation of up to 80 percent of some American beekeepers' hives is relayed resignedly. And because finding the cause is so complex, there's some lack of clarity. Still, France seemed to lick a similar problem a decade ago, which suggests a partial solution.
Distributed by the socially aware Co-operative/Dogwoof partnership, the film is part of a wider awareness campaign. Despite its schoolroom tone, The Vanishing of the Bees sounds an alarm; it's essential we heed it.