Elephant rescues in Thailand are rare, unpredictable and often life threatening. After waiting over 2 years, actor/director Ashley Bell and a team of elephant rescuers led by world renowned Asian elephant conservationist and TIME Magazine’s Hero of Asia, Sangdeaun Lek Chailert, embark on a daring mission to rescue Noi Na, a 70-year old captive, partially blind trekking elephant and bring her 500 miles across Thailand to freedom. African elephants are slaughtered for their ivory, but sadly the plight of the Asian Elephant has been completely overlooked even though they are the elephant we are most familiar with in zoos, circuses and elephant rides.

Love & Bananas: An Elephant Story exposes the cruel secret that every Asian elephant has had to endure to become a service animal: a process known as Pajan, aka The Crush Box.   As the documentary unfolds the audience learns that there’s no need to abuse an elephant to control it, you can motivate an elephant to follow your lead simply with love and bananas. Love & Bananas will hopefully provide a solution to keeping this species alive. The film ignites a sense of hope, while exposing the plight of Asian elephants and the people who work tirelessly to save them.