Narrated by John Hurt (who I could listen to all day and night), the series goes through various environments including oceans, deserts, artic, jungles, mountains, grasslands, rivers and cities. Each geographic location focuses on multiple groups of people/tribes that reside and survive in these different types of places. For example, when they talk about mountains, you’ll find a story about Mongolians that hunt food using an eagle. Yep, you read that right; they have a pet ‘eagle’ that seeks and destroys for them. The visitations to certain groups lasts around 10-15 minutes (or so it seemed). Each episode has about 3-4 groups in it (depending on time) and features a definite beginning and ending; sort of like a nice short story. In other words these are very ‘contained’ stories, which is tough to do when you’re taping documentary-esque footage.
Stories aside, the best part of this DVD set is how breathtaking the footage is in almost every story that was shot. The footage wasn’t simply breathtaking because of angles or shot selection, rather it was breathtaking because viewers wouldn’t be able to visit some places due to the danger. One example of this is in the mountains episode where the camera crew goes to visit Kawah Ijen Volcano. The episode segment follows miners into the mouth of this acid lake volcano where noxious gases were constantly spewing. The camera crew had amazing footage of the lake, which is a beautiful clear blue, and of the miners extracting sulfur from the walls of the volcano. Literally the crew had to wear gas masks to shoot this segment. That’s how incredibly bad the situation was, but because they got the miners on film we got to see what these guys do for a living to survive in the mountains. Again, breathtaking material that most human beings certainly couldn’t experience on their own.
Other segments that had me drooling for more included the jungle episode where a tribe had to build a house to live in before the rainy season. No big deal, right? Yep, if the house wasn’t in a tree over 100 feet above the ground. The BBC folks used clever harnesses and pulleys to follow the tribe up the ladder to the house, which is turns out beyond gorgeous. Imagine a crane shot going from top to bottom seamlessly and you’ve got the type of shots in this episode. Another segment that was pretty neat to watch involved women crossing the Sahara desert in search of a single water well. The flowing desert dunes mixed with the harsh sandstorms truly brought their near plight to life thanks to some very organized shooting. It was truly amazing to watch, especially when they finally arrive at their destination.
Again, the visuals unbelievably breathtaking.
Visuals and stories aside, the DVD set was well organized and flowed from one episode to the next pretty flawlessly. The episodes keep you hooked, much like Planet Earth. If you need an example look no further than my experience. I received this DVD set yesterday (Monday) and watched every episode without feeling the 10+ hours one bit. That is what makes a documentary series great, when you simply don’t know time has passed. What’s funny is that I can see myself revisiting this set two months from now. I can see this being a regular viewing session each year, especially as my kids get older and are in need of a worldly education on DVD. Its simply amazing stuff and it is organized very well.
All is not perfect, though. I did have some issues with the narration. I love John Hurt’s voice, so he’s not the issue. The issue lies with the script sometimes falling into an apology or unnecessary explanation about things. For example, in one jungle episode they have a moment where monkeys are hunted. For some reason the BBC felt the need to explain that the monkeys would be used for food and that the tribe hunting them didn’t hunt that many monkeys. It didn’t go with the footage or the story, as I noticed it immediately. The PETAs and politically correct world does not belong in this series and it should have been kept out. Maybe the BBC didn’t mean to sound this way, but it certainly came off that way. It happened more than once, too. There was footage in the rainforest where workers were chopping down trees. The script read something to the effect that the trees weren’t being removed like companies removed them. It hit on the fact that the workers didn’t ‘rake’ the rainforest trees, rather they took what they needed. Again, it sounded way too apologetic and it simply didn’t need to be that way. This documentary was created to explain how humans lived across the planet and our rules we have in Britain and the United States simply don’t apply to everyone else.
That was my biggest complaint. It didn’t happen often, but it did happen enough to notice.
With that said, what about the features? The features include 10 ten-minute documentaries called ‘Behind the Lens’. After each episode you get to see some trials and tribulations that the crew went through in a particular area. For example, in the arctic episode you get to see a scary moment where the crew gets stranded on an ice drift after ice melts away overnight. It’s intense and scary, but nonetheless interesting. I loved these little segments and was really glad they included them. The other featurettes include more detailed explanation on two episodes including the visit to the volcano where the crew shows more detail on how they and the equipment survived the shoot. Pretty cool stuff, overall.
