Award-winning film highlights lasting damage from X-Press Pearl disaster in Sri Lanka

• “This Is Not a Pearl,” a short film by Sri Lankan filmmaker Tharindu Ramanayaka, uses a poetic narrative of a pearl oyster mistaking toxic plastic pellets, or nurdles, for her pearl to symbolize the environmental devastation caused by the 2021 MV X-Press Pearl disaster.
• The sinking of the MV X-Press Pearl off Sri Lanka’s coast released 1,680 metric tons of plastic nurdles, marking the world’s largest nurdle spill and triggering long-term damage to marine ecosystems.

COLOMBO — Beneath Sri Lanka’s serene waters, a pearl oyster cherished her pearl, living in harmony. But disaster struck when a blazing ship sank, poisoning the sea. Entangled in debris, she lost her treasured pearl. Desperate, she started to search despite the waves and found glistening orbs. Believing she had recovered her lost pearl, she embraced the glistening objects. Yet, they were not pearls, but toxic plastic pellets, part of the ship’s deadly cargo. As the poison seeped into her, she closed her shell one last time. The ocean, once her sanctuary, became her grave…| read more on Mongabay