Narrated by Sandra Hüller, Underland takes audiences on a mesmerizing journey into the world that lies beneath our feet, where mystery, science, history, and human curiosity intersect with profound beauty.
The documentary adapts Robert Macfarlane’s bestselling book to the screen with stunning visuals and thoughtful exploration.
Produced by Darren Aronofsky, Ari Handel, Lauren Greenwood, and Jessica Harrop, the film follows explorers, scientists, and wanderers as they venture through caves, storm drains, deep underground labs, and other hidden environments rarely seen by human eyes, blending intellectual inquiry with cinematic splendour.
Directed by Rob Petit, Underland first premiered at the 2025 Tribeca Film Festival, then went on to screen at DC/DOX Film Festival, the Hamptons International Film Festival, the Mill Valley Film Festival, and the New Hampshire Film Festival. Oscilloscope Laboratories is set to release the film in theaters in Summer 2026.
The documentary voyages into worlds rarely glimpsed by human eyes to explore the world beneath our feet. One not of fear and darkness, but rather of knowledge and wonder that can be found nowhere else. Beginning in the shallow soils beneath an old ash tree, we travel alongside several ‘astronauts of the underworld’ into ancient sacred caves, flooded storm drains, melting glaciers, underwater burial chambers, and a deep underground laboratory built to solve the mysteries of the Universe. Underland dives deep into the Earth to present a groundbreaking vision for rethinking our lives on this fragile surface.
In a review from Observer covering its Tribeca screening, the film was praised for playing “like a sprawling epic about the scope of human existence” despite its relatively brief 79-minute runtime. The review notes, “Petit’s artistic approach is both representational—in that each surface becomes a focused, concentrated symbol for larger narratives that have defined human existence—and in strange ways, invitational. Through its exploration of spaces rarely put to film, the movie urges a more thoughtful meditation on our fraught link to nature and to the world at large, collapsing past and present into a single point on screen.”
Watch the official trailer for Underland, above.
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