First HDTV's Russian Viewers Follow the Trek Through the 'Great North'

Janson Media announced today that it has licensed the documentary Great North of the Giant Screen Films Collection to First HDTV of Russia. Originally filmed for release in IMAX® theaters, Great North will air on the broadcasters Travel HD channel devoted to travel and wildlife of our planet.

Experience a whirling journey of rich landscapes, course over the rugged terrain with rhythmic energy like that of a herd of migrating caribou, and share the extraordinary plight of the people who have long lived in harmony with the harsh elements of the Arctic.

If you think that life in the Great North is a daily, harsh struggle for survival, well, think again! Of course, it does take special gifts to live and prosper in the world"s most inhospitable zone, but the North is also a place of poetry and magic, music and myth-making. People have been living in the far North for millennia, and they have developed fascinating and unique ways of thriving in their environment.

Their greatest ally? The caribou, in Canada, and its close cousin in Sweden, the reindeer. With an Inuit guide, Great North follows the herds of caribou through the Canadian North as they make their annual trek of more than 7,000 kilometres, which gives them the title of greatest migrating land mammal on Earth. The white deserts of the winter, the brief and colorful summer buzzing with flies — the herds face all these conditions and more, as their migration opens a window on the Northern landscape for us.

In the Arctic reaches of Sweden, the Saami people learned to tame the reindeer even before other cultures elsewhere on our planet learned to domesticate the horse. The Saami are the cowboys of the North, and we"re invited to the autumn round-up to join them as they care for their herds of reindeer.

Great North shows us unique ways of living that are perfectly adapted to extreme environments. Patience, a respect for nature"s lessons and the bonds of community are what"s needed. Inside their snow houses and tents, we watch the Inuit and Saami passing on what they know to their children, making sure that their way of life will remain eternal.

The First HDTV Network was launched in April 2007 and features a diverse mix of channels including Travel HD, Zoo TV, Teen TV, Fishing & Hunting TV Hi Life, Cinema, and Woman"s World.

K2 Communications, Janson Media"s distribution partner for its Giant Screen Film Collection, is a leading-edge production and distribution organization specializing in emerging non-traditional media programming, including Giant Screen Films for both large format and digital theaters, Video on Demand, Interactive Media, branded content and High Definition television and DVD. K2 has extensive experience supervising large-scale entertainment projects from concept to completion, and an impressive track record securing corporate sponsorship for its projects.

Established in 1989, Janson Media is an independent content distribution company based in the United States, with a rights portfolio of over 1,500 hours of exclusive programming available for licensing to worldwide television, VOD, DVD/video, and emerging new media platforms. The company has licensed programming to virtually every country in the world, and its clients include nearly every major broadcaster or media company, as well as a wide range of DVD labels and distributors. Janson Media is also a publisher/ manufacturer of award-winning DVDs.