Anima Mundi is a 1991 short documentary film

Documentary film

Documentary films constitute a broad category of nonfictional motion pictures intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record...

 directed by Godfrey Reggio

Godfrey Reggio

Godfrey Reggio is an American director of experimental documentary films.-Life:Born and raised in New Orleans, Louisiana. Reggio co-founded La Clinica de la Gente, a facility that provided medical care to 12,000 community members in Santa Fe, and La Gente, a community-organizing project in...

. The film focuses on the world of nature

Nature

Nature, in the broadest sense, is equivalent to the natural world, physical world, or material world. "Nature" refers to the phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general...

 and wildlife

Wildlife

Wildlife includes all non-domesticated plants, animals and other organisms. Domesticating wild plant and animal species for human benefit has occurred many times all over the planet, and has a major impact on the environment, both positive and negative....

, particularly jungle

Jungle

A Jungle is an area of land in the tropics overgrown with dense vegetation.The word jungle originates from the Sanskrit word jangala which referred to uncultivated land. Although the Sanskrit word refers to "dry land", it has been suggested that an Anglo-Indian interpretation led to its...

s, sealife

Marine biology

Marine biology is the scientific study of organisms in the ocean or other marine or brackish bodies of water. Given that in biology many phyla, families and genera have some species that live in the sea and others that live on land, marine biology classifies species based on the environment rather...

, and insect

Insect

Insects are a class of living creatures within the arthropods that have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body , three pairs of jointed legs, compound eyes, and two antennae...

s. The movie was commissioned by Italian jewellers Bulgari

Bulgari

Bulgari is an Italian jeweler and luxury goods retailer which has been owned by the French firm LVMH since October 2011. The trademark is usually written "BVLGARI" in the classical Latin alphabet , and is derived from the surname of the company's Greek founder, Sotirio Voulgaris...

 for use by the World Wide Fund for Nature

World Wide Fund for Nature

The World Wide Fund for Nature is an international non-governmental organization working on issues regarding the conservation, research and restoration of the environment, formerly named the World Wildlife Fund, which remains its official name in Canada and the United States...

 in their Biological Diversity Program.

The film was scored by Philip Glass

Philip Glass

Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...

, who also worked with Reggio on Koyaanisqatsi

Koyaanisqatsi

Koyaanisqatsi also known as Koyaanisqatsi: Life Out of Balance, is a 1982 film directed by Godfrey Reggio with music composed by Philip Glass and cinematography by Ron Fricke....

, Powaqqatsi

Powaqqatsi

Powaqqatsi , or Powaqqatsi: Life in Transformation, is the 1988 sequel to the experimental 1982 documentary film Koyaanisqatsi, by Godfrey Reggio. It is the second film in the Qatsi trilogy....

, and Naqoyqatsi

Naqoyqatsi

Naqoyqatsi , also known as Naqoyqatsi: Life as War, is a 2002 documentary film directed by Godfrey Reggio and edited by Jon Kane, with music composed by Philip Glass. It is the third and final film in the Qatsi trilogy....

. Anima Mundi features many of the techniques from the Qatsi

Qatsi trilogy

The Qatsi trilogy is the informal name given to a series of three films produced by Godfrey Reggio and scored by Philip Glass:* Koyaanisqatsi: Life out of balance * Powaqqatsi: Life in transformation * Naqoyqatsi: Life as war...

trilogy, and was produced in between the release of Powaqqatsi and Naqoyqatsi, but is not considered to be directly related to the series.