When I was a kid growing up in the 1970s, Sesame Street was a good friend on the television. My parents knew it was safe to leave me in front of the TV for an hour. And when the Electric Company was on, it was a two hour event. Now as a parent, I know the content has changed but the quality remains high and I trust Sesame Street to educate and entertain this new generation just as well as educated me.
The Sesame Street: 20 Years and Still Counting documentary was produced in 1989, covering the first 20 years of its continuing run on PBS. The series has continued to have another 20 years of success since then, so I can hardly wait to see what the show looks like in another 20! The documentary, hosted by Bill Cosby, provides a look back at the beginnings of the series, from its humble beginnings in 1969 to the worldwide acclaim and adoption it’s seen since then.
Watching with my two daughters, the video looks out of date but offers a great historical perspective on the series’ amazing legacy. Not only do you get some wonderful musical performances from Ray Charles and Plácido Domingo, but you get to hear from some of the actors who have called Sesame Street their home forever. What was more interesting to me was that Jim Henson appears to introduce the show, only a year before his untimely death. Neither of my girls knew him on sight, but when I mentioned the name they knew immediately who he was.
Seeing a much younger Luis (Emilio Delgado), Maria (Sonia Manzano), and Bob (Bob McGrath) really took me back to my childhood. It was quite obvious that the trio believed in the series from the beginning – not only as an integrated cast, but the first educational show to focus on using a curriculum to teach kids the alphabet, their numbers, language skills, shapes, colors, science, and much much more. Though the series went through occasional cast changes, such as when Mr. Hooper (Will Lee) passed away in 1983, that core trio has remained in place for more than 40 years now.
Add to that the many characters who call Sesame Street home – Bert and Ernie, Grover and the Grouch, Big Bird, Cookie Monster, Kermit, and the whole gang – and you end up with a snapshot of that wonderful world. Cosby, with his usual humor and style, manages to interact with them all and give us a walking tour of the street most kids across America (and around the world) know and love.
It was very interesting to listen to the Sesame Street theme in different languages and see how different countries and cultures had adapted the show for their own children. Big Bird as a parrot instead of an eight foot yellow bird was fun to see, and listening to the theme song in Spanish, French, and Hebrew was intriguing. It’s amazing to think that kids in Germany, Israel, the West Bank, the Netherlands, and elsewhere are all benefiting from the pioneering work done by the show creators Jim Henson and Joan Cooney.
I have to admit that it’s a bit odd to me that Lionsgate chose now to release this special on DVD, but I think it proves the staying power of one of the tent poles of public television. Today, just like every day for the last 40+ years, children around the world have tuned in to learn and have fun at home.
Though I think this documentary will appeal more to parents than to kids, Sesame Street: 20 Years and Still Counting provides a historical record of the great work Sesame Street has done for four decades and will hopefully do for my grandkids over the next 20. Hopefully we will see more of these “messages in a bottle” from the past to inform the viewers of tomorrow about the enduring legacy of this series.
This article first appeared at BlogCritics.org here.
–Fitz
p.s. Pick up this and other great Sesame Street DVDs below!
What is life? At its most basic level, it is a state of being alive at a cellular level or greater. And yet, we live on a world teeming with life in such abundance and diversity of form that it is so much more than that. Ultimately, I think that is what the most recent production from the BBC’s Natural History Unit is about.
Life was four years in the making from the producers of Planet Earth and The Blue Planet and takes us on another amazing journey around the world capturing on film the dazzling diversity of life we are blessed with on Earth. As with their previous productions, these filmmakers have provided us with the shock and awe of the natural world and shown us things we may never see otherwise.
Characterized by shots in real time and slow motion, we get to see creatures, alone and in groups, doing what they do best – surviving and perpetuating their species. From the tale of the gobie fish in Hawaii climbing waterfalls to spawn in perfect pools at the top of rocky cliffs and flying fish to the cycle of hunter and hunted played out in countless environments each day we are presented with crystal clear imagery that mesmerizes with almost every frame.
Originally broadcast at the end of 2009, the ten episodes of Life each focus on a unique aspect of living organisms on Earth.
The series starts with the “Challenges of Life” where the filmmakers present examples of how plants, animals, and insects manage to find enough food to eat and find ways to reproduce to ensure the continuation of their kind. Amazing footage of what a small mother strawberry poison dart frog does to keep her tadpoles safe in the rainforest canopy and the Pacific giant octopus sacrificing herself so that her children may survive show the lengths to which some creatures will go to protect and care for their young.
Life then walks through an episode for each major group of creatures on the planet – “Reptiles and Amphibians,” “Mammals,” “Fish,” “Birds,” and “Insects.” Each episode shows the cycles inherent in all living things – from the groupers spreading fertilized eggs in clouds beneath the waves that get eaten by predators to the damselfly’s chance to lay eggs interrupted by a leaping frog. Opportunities abound for all creatures in the food chain to do their part to survive.
The series then shifts to “Creatures of the Deep,” where photographers managed to show a seal carcass beneath the Antarctic ice provides food for urchins, sea stars, and nemertean worms proving that creatures big and small will find ways to eat and reproduce even in the harshest conditions. The amazing footage of hundreds of thousands of spider crabs moulting in the shallows off South Australia was amazingly bizarre, yet memorable.
In “Plants” we see the other side of the equation, from the forest floor to the canopy, the ocean floor to the desert – flora has also found ways to adapt and thrive in inhospitable places. The exposed roots of the Epiphytes in the rain forest canopy trapping water and leaves for nutrients provide a stark contrast to the Bristlecone pine trees that can live up to 5,000 years with a six-week growing season above 9800 feet.
And lastly, the series focuses on the “Primates” – our distant cousins on the evolutionary chart. These intelligent, social creatures – from baboons and macaques using troop dynamics and bloodlines to determine the outcome of disputes to the White-faced capuchins using rocks to break open clams for dinner. It’s impossible not to see similarities to the human condition that we experience every day.
Though we weren’t able to catch each episode as it aired in the Discovery Channel, we were excited to see the series become available on DVD recently. It’s another amazing achievement for the BBC Natural History Unit and their dedicated, amazing photography teams scattered around the globe.
Each episode on the DVD was accompanied by a “Life on Location” special feature, which documented some of the challenges the film crews faced while trying to get footage for the production. Though short, each provided a glimpse into the commitment necessary to become a world-class nature photographer.
My one complaint with the series is that they chose Oprah Winfrey to do the narration this time. Though Oprah is a force to be reckoned with in her own right and the scripts were well written, her voice has an interesting tendency to put me to sleep. The visuals were stunning and I wanted to hear the stories, but found her narration monotone enough to make it difficult to watch.
And as if they wanted to rub in how boring Oprah’s narration was, they had David Attenborough narrate the extras for each episode that describe the challenges faced by the crews sent out to get the footage. Though nearing retirement, Attenborough’s voice seemed infused with energy and life compared to listening to Oprah.
Though tempted to use the “Music Only” viewing option, we managed to get through Oprah’s droning and enjoy the entire series at my house. Hopefully they will find better narrators in the future. Jim Carrey would be a good choice (he recently narrated Under the Sea for IMAX) and James Earl Jones would also be great.
Don’t let Oprah stop you from enjoying Life on DVD. It’s another amazing documentary series from the BBC that you won’t want to miss. Hopefully they’ll have a better narrator for the upcoming Frozen Planet series to air in 2012 on the Discovery Channel!
Honestly, I’m not someone who watches many documentaries. Though I admire the use of television and movies to educate, I typically look to those media as ways to escape for a while. That said, occasionally a documentary will slip through and catch me completely off guard.
In my own life, I’ve seen glimpses of what alcohol and drugs can do to a person. And more recently, I’ve caught glimpses of what bipolar disorder can do to a family. And though you can find help for people with these diseases and addictions, they have to somehow acknowledge and accept the help or it doesn’t really help. You can see this again and again in the entertainment industry with folks going in and out of rehab like it has a revolving door.
So learning that an accomplished actor like Joe Pantoliano has been fighting his own battle with mental illness and is doing everything he can to help others likewise afflicted is not only motivating, but a sign of hope in a time when most of us are concerned about things beyond our control like the economy that others are focused on making a real difference in people’s lives.
Pantoliano started a foundation – NKM2 (No Kidding, Me 2!) – to fight the stigma of mental illness and raise awareness across the board. Largely focused on education, NKM2 is really trying to open the eyes of the general populace and get them to understand how mental diseases affect individuals and their families to hopefully break down the barriers between so-called “normal” people and folks with “issues”… Since according to the NIH one in every four people has some sort of mental illness – there is no “us” vs. “them” mentality – we are all affected.
The No Kidding, Me 2! documentary clearly expresses Pantoliano’s own road from being a victim of mental disease to having it under control with the help of medical professionals, friends, and family, but it goes beyond that and shares the stories of several others on their own roads to recovery. People from all walks of life – a surgeon, a psychologist, a war veteran, and three high school students – share their stories of where they were and where they were as of the filming of the documentary. These are heartbreaking stories but also hopeful ones and that’s the key I think. Not only must we figure out what we can do to get this type of disease into the limelight but we must listen to the people who deal with it every day to better understand what we can do to help them, and therefore ourselves, not only cope with it but improve their quality of life.
The lesson to take away from NKM2 is that we must listen because the lives that we help may be our own. Pantoliano and NKM2 have done an amazing job so far, but they need your help. May is National Mental Health Awareness Month. A portion of the DVD sales will go to the NKM2 foundation, but they can always use more help. Let’s do what we can. It’s an eye-opening documentary that everyone should see. Check out the NKM2.org website for more information.
This article originally appeared at Blogcritics.org here.
Lately there seems to be a resurgence of myths in media… Movies such as Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief and the remake of Clash of the Titans (and the rumored sequels to both) made a combined $230+ million at the box office – so obviously there’s a market there. For me it’s been far too long since we saw myths on the big screen, so hopefully this won’t be the end of classic myths and monsters find their way back into popular culture. Big screen or small, it’s great to see them back and bigger than ever.
That said, the History Channel has once again presented an impressive series about Greek and Norse gods and heroes as well as the heroic journey of a certain group of Hobbits. Clash of the Gods: The Complete Season One has been split into 10 episodes with great content and solid production value. Using the myths and stories as a starting point, the series explores them through a combination of history, traditional storytelling, CGI, make-up, costumes, and sets. It’s a far cry from the filmstrips and dry texts I remember from my school days.
Starting with the father figure of Greek myth, the first episode centers on Zeus and how he fought his father, the Titan Cronos, to free his brothers and sisters trapped within the tyrant’s belly. You see, Cronos feared that one of his children would rise up and overthrow him. So as his wife Rhea gave birth to a child, Cronos would snatch it and swallow it whole. When Zeus was about to be born, Rhea decided his fate would be different. When Cronos came to swallow Zeus, Rhea gave him a rock to swallow instead and he never knew the difference. Zeus was then raised in secret and hatched his plan to free his siblings and take his rightful place as a god. And that was just the beginning of Zeus’ rise to power.
Once Zeus and his siblings were in power, the series could explore other aspects of Greek mythology and other stories. Later episodes dealt with Hercules and his many labors and hardships, the god and realm of Hades and his shared time with his consort Persephone, the tale of the Minotaur of Crete and the Labyrinth built by Daedalus and his son Icarus, and so on. The first seven episodes deal exclusively with Greek gods, demigods, heroes, and monsters.
In the last three episodes, we are entertained by tales beyond the Aegean Sea. We learn of Beowulf, the great Scandanavian hero who defeated Grendel in the classic poem. We discover the Christian, German, and Scandanavian roots of the world of J.R.R. Tolkien‘s Hobbit and Lord of the Rings series. And finally we explore the different realms of Yggdrasil, the World Tree – Asgard, home to the gods; Midgard, world of humankind; and Hel, the netherworld. Thor, the warrior of Norse myth, is locked in a battle to the end of days – Ragnarok – with Nidhogg, a serpent big enough to wrap all the way around the World Tree.
Beyond simply walking us through these various tales, we learn of the archaeological evidence found to support them. For example, we see some of the caves that the Greeks thought were entrances to Hades, Greek realm of the dead. And we see the walls of what may have been the legendary city of Troy from Homer’s stories of the Trojan War and the aftermath. It was amazing to consider that these myths were most likely based on real world places, people, and events.
The colored contact-lenses used by the human actors throughout the series got a bit old after a while, I have to say that they did present an easy way to know which characters were gods or demigods and which were merely human. For example, characters such as Zeus and Poseidon wore bright blue- or white-colored contacts as full gods and characters such as Hercules and Perseus, both demigods with a god as a father, had slightly less brightly-colored contacts. Even Thor had red contacts in one of the final episodes. But characters such as Odysseus, who were completely human, wore no contacts that we could see.
If you’re looking for a way to learn more about Greek mythology or merely want to see a well-written and produced series about heroes and gods, Clash of the Gods: The Complete Season One is a fun way to reconnect with classic myths and legends. I hope to see Clash of the Gods continue with tales from other areas of the world such as Egypt, India, or perhaps ancient Babylon. There are many more gods, goddesses, and heroes to explore!
–Fitz
p.s. Check out this series on DVD from Barnes & Noble below!
Though my family loves seeing films of all kinds on a huge IMAX screen, I will be the first to admit that it’s a bit expensive to do so regularly. Instead, we find ourselves watching some of the beautiful documentaries on DVD. That’s certainly the case with IMAX: Under the Sea, in which Jim Carrey narrates a few colorful, entertaining, and cautionary tales about the denizens of the deep blue sea.
Originally released in IMAX theaters in 2009, this short (41 minute) film presents some absolutely stunning video of some of the most beautiful spots in the blue waters of Papua New Guinea, Australia, the Great Barrier Reef, and Indonesia. From the vents spouting gas bubbles like undersea fountains to the amazing array of colors and types of undersea life, the film does an amazing job of giving viewers just a glimpse of the Coral Triangle – home to a majority of the marine species in the world.
The crystal clear waters were unbelievably perfect for filming, showing the brilliant blues, bright oranges, reds, greens, yellows and shadows beneath the surface. The patience of these videographers to capture just the right shot gets you right into the action. How they ever found a crab willing to wear a jellyfish as a hat is beyond me.
But the show stealer for me was the courting dance of the female cuttlefish and her two male suitors set to “Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps” by Doris Day. Carrey speaks quietly about their mating technique as the males try to get her attention long enough to perpetuate the species. The dance seems perfectly timed to the music as the female tries admirably to ignore her suitors. Her “playing hard to get” shows that we’re not so different as a species after all.
Though Jim Carrey is more well known for his comedic roles in movies like Bruce Almighty and Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, he does an admirable job of maintaining an even tempo to the narrative track written by Howard Hall, who also directed the film and acted as the director of photography. Carrey’s humor slips in now and then, as when describing a wobbegong shark as a shag carpet or a stone fish having waited several days getting frustrated after missing a meal. But there’s a seriousness in his voice as well and it’s easy to hear his own concern for this delicate environment and what humankind has done to affect it.
As with many documentaries, the film serves to entertain and educate, showing not only the beauty that remains brilliantly alive but how changes to seawater temperature and acidity due to air and water pollution affect the coral reefs and the thousands of species that depend on them. Ultimately, we must be more aware of the environmental impact of our decisions on the surface or film will be all we have left to remember these beautiful undersea vistas.
Watching with my wife and children, we really enjoyed IMAX: Under the Sea even on our much smaller screen. This film, from the makers of Deep Sea and Into the Deep, does an amazing job of showing the beauty beneath the waves and expressing the urgency with which we must take better care of our planet’s wonders.
For more details, be sure to check out the film’s website at UnderTheSeaMovie.com. The film is available in a Blu-ray Combo Pack, on DVD, and for download.
Article first published as DVD Review: IMAX: Under the Sea on Blogcritics.org
–Fitz
p.s. Pick up Under the Sea and other great documentary DVDs at Barnes & Noble below!
As a nature documentary junkie, I’m attracted to shiny objects like the ones shown in the Discovery Channel‘s upcoming series – LIFE. This 11-part series premieres on Sunday, March 21st at 8PM ET/PT featuring stunning video and Oprah Winfrey providing the narration.
Here’s an amazing clip of some flying fish!
LIFE comes to us from the makers of Planet Earth, which was amazing.
According to a recent Discovery Channel press release:
Narrated by global media leader and philanthropist Oprah Winfrey and more than four years in the making, the 11-part series LIFE is the definitive exploration of the adaptability and diversity of life on earth, revealing the most spectacular, bizarre and fascinating behaviors that living things have devised to thrive. The premiere episode of LIFE, Challenges of Life, provides an overview and sets the stage for the ambitious series. A special Making Of episode caps the series and tells the incredible stories of the dozens of men and women who spent days, weeks and months patiently waiting for a perfect shot. Other episodes showcase Birds, deep sea marine invertebrates (Creatures of the Deep), Fish, hunting mammals (Hunters and Hunted), Insects, Mammals, Plants, Primates and Reptiles & Amphibians.
Following its premiere across the seven Discovery U.S. networks, LIFE will air in two-episode installments each Sunday on Discovery Channel and Discovery Channel HD from 8-10PM ET, culminating with The Making of LIFE at 10PM ET on April 18.
Tune in to watch these amazing spectacles of nature caught on video. I know I’ll be watching!
Sometime in the mid 1980s, I was exposed to Monty Python. It was, of course, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, which of course stunted my growth and imprinted itself upon my brain to the point where Python lines began creeping into every day conversation. My parents were appalled. Neither could stand the humorous antics of these men dressed up in costumes banging coconuts together to make clip-clopping noises.
Yes, it’s true. I’m a Monty Python addict. But nothing really prepared me for the depth of Monty Python: Almost The Truth. As a Monty Python fan, I learned things I had never known before in each and every episode. Because of this, I will recommend to all of my closest friends (most of them Python fans) that they must watch the series on A&E and pick up the DVD set.
But I’m getting ahead of myself here. So why is this such a ground-breaking documentary series? Because, like all great documentaries, it presents information that you may or may not have heard before in such a way as to make you think about things more deeply. I never knew how the Monty Python troupe came together or what they did before. It simply wasn’t something I considered prior to watching this series.
Starting with Episode 1, we learn the humble beginnings of each member of the troupe and how they found their funny bones on their own or in pairs before eventually finding their way together for Monty Python’s Flying Circus. By the time you get to Episode 4, you realize that not only are they very funny and talented, but they’ve all gone through some rough times as artists and people. And by Episode 6, you come to find that they’ve all found ways to move beyond Python and find their own ways in the world.
Some of the startling facts that I learned from Monty Python: Almost The Truth:
Terry Gilliam had a life before Python in the magazine business.
Monty Python and the Holy Grail was financed by a bunch of big name bands in the 1970s, including Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, and Jethro Tull.
Graham Chapman was an amazingly functional alcoholic. I always knew he had alcohol issues in the Flying Circus days, but I didn’t realize how much.
Documentaries are often long, dreary, boring affairs. But Monty Python: Almost The Truth couldn’t be further from the norm. All the way through I felt entertained and educated.
When you arrive at Disc 3, you find a collection of sketches, extended interviews, interview outtakes, and the Terry Gilliam Picture Gallery. Among the sketches are three of my favorites – “The Parrot Sketch,” “Ministry of Silly Walks,” and “The Cheese Shop.” The fact that these guys could sit down and write lines like “He’s off the twig! He’s kicked the bucket, He’s shuffled off his mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin’ choir invisible!! THIS IS AN EX-PARROT!!”, the absolutely insane list of cheeses from around the world that is somehow made funny by the fact that the proprietor of the cheese shop has no cheese at all, and then the simple yet odd physical comedy of John Cleese doing his silly walk… It makes me laugh just to think of any of them.
As I said at the beginning, this collection is a must have for any serious Monty Python fan. Rush to your favorite retailer and pick up your copy of Monty Python: Almost The Truth today. You won’t be sorry!
–Fitz
p.s. Pick up this and other Monty Python DVDs below!
Though I’ve never been to Yellowstone, it’s hard to ignore its beauty, let alone its importance to conservation efforts around the world. Yellowstone was the first National Park established by the U.S. Congress in 1872. It spans an area nearly 3,500 square miles at nearly 8,000 feet above sea level and is crisscrossed with geysers, rivers, forests, and Yellowstone Lake. Home to nearly 60 species of mammals – wolves, lynx, elk, grizzly bears, moose, pronghorn, and many others – Yellowstone attracts nearly 2 million visitors every year.
Yellowstone: Battle for Life should encourage many more visitors to take the journey. Narrated by Peter Firth, this documentary from BBC Earth contains three hour-long episodes that focus on nearly an entire year in the park, as well as some cool extras.
The series starts in “Winter” and introduces viewers to this harsh, frozen world dominated by the Druid Peak wolves and stalwart buffalo herds in the park. The longer the winter goes, the weaker the animals in the park become, making them easier targets for the wolves. And at the end of winter, the bears emerge from hibernation, hungry and eager to find any food hidden under the snow and ice.
One of the amazing scenes in this episode was of a red foxhunting mice. As the mice would move beneath the snow, the fox would listen from above – cautiously and quietly moving close enough for an aerobatic dive to get at its dinner. Simply beautiful.
From Winter we move to “Summer”, which encompasses Spring and the beginning of Summer in Yellowstone. As life returns to the park. Grizzly bear moms and their cubs are on the hunt for shoots, berries, and fish to fill empty bellies. But they are not alone – male bears are also on the prowl and are a danger to her cubs. As the Spring thaw begins, bison move down to pastures soon to become lush and green once more.
And when “Autumn” arrives, Winter isn’t far behind. Male elk begin their battles for supremacy before retreating to warmer valleys to wait again until Spring. However, what really caught me off guard was the footage of the beavers working in the ponds along riverbanks building their dams and storing food for winter.
In addition to the three episodes, there are three extras that tell stories of some of the people who keep Yellowstone going. One about the man who clears snow off the many man-made structures in the park for five months out of the year. One about the folks who watch the geysers erupt in an attempt to both document the events for scientific study, but to also inform park guests about likely eruption times. And the last is about a man who swims in the Yellowstone River and is passionate about making sure the indigenous cutthroat trout of the region win their battle against the lake trout imported for sport fishing in the region.
As always, the BBC has done an amazing job capturing the breathtaking beauty of Yellowstone. Add to that the depth of the information provided through narration and the music by E dward Butt, and you have an engrossing and entertaining documentary. At times, with the amazing flyover footage of the park, I almost felt like I was watching a feature film.
If you are a fan of nature documentaries, especially the latest series of great shows such as Planet Earth, Earth, and Nature’s Most Amazing Events, Yellowstone: Battle for Life should be at the top of your list. Be sure to check it out at your local rental or retail video store.
–Fitz
p.s. Pick up this and other great nature documentaries from Amazon below!
Every now and then we get to witness events in nature on the big screen or television that are just astounding. In 2007, Planet Earth from the BBC and the Discovery Channel came to America, narrated by Sigourney Weaver and showed an amazing array of life on our planet in glorious HD quality. Since then, I think the BBC and other documentary filmmakers have been working hard to top themselves.
Though Nature’s Most Amazing Events is an incredible accomplishment, I don’t think it quite matches up to the splendor or Planet Earth. That said, it includes some unbelievable footage shot of some inhospitable and nearly unreachable places all over the globe over a period of years by extremely dedicated people. However, where Planet Earth had little time to focus on a single area and the stories of individual animals, Nature’s Most Amazing Events uses storytelling to create an emotional bond with the audience.
This 2-DVD set includes all six episodes from the series, and appends a “diary” to the end of each. Each diary tells the stories of the filmmakers as they were trying to get to these places and record the footage used for the episode.
Narrated by David Attenborough, his very correct British accent only made it difficult to understand what he was saying in a few places. Notably, each time he said “school” we heard it as “shoal,” which caused a bit of confusion for myself and my family. But once we figured out he was saying “school,” we understood exactly what it was he’d been saying.
In “The Great Melt,” you learn about the impact of global warming on the Arctic ice and the dangers the increased melting poses for the polar bears. However, beyond the polar bears you begin to see the huge circle of life as melting ice sends fresh water into the sea and creates habitats for an incredible array of fish, birds, seals, whales, and more. We were particularly amazed by the shots of the narwhal migration through the ice. Though I’d seen pictures of these mysterious creatures before, actually seeing them wind their way through the canals and cracks opening in the melting ice was beautiful to behold.
“The Great Migration” and “The Great Flood” told stories of the animals of Africa dealing with hostile and often deadly environmental conditions, yet somehow finding ways to survive in the Serengeti and Bostswana’s Okavango Delta. We were blown away by the transformation of the Okavango from cracked and dried sandy plains to a lush, green field and swamp with bountiful fish, grasses, and wildlife.
But I think our favorites were “The Great Salmon Run” and “The Great Tide”. In “The Great Salmon Run” we follow salmon as they migrated back to the place where they were spawned in British Columbia. Along the way there are natural barriers to overcome as well as hungry predators. In “The Great Tide,” billions of sardines draw thousands of predators to the coasts of South Africa for a feeding frenzy beyond belief.
The photography was top notch for all of the episodes and they really do bring you as close to the action as you could possibly be without actually being there yourself. Definitely an amazing accomplishment by a devoted and talented crew of people all around the world.
Beyond the episodes themselves we were captivated when the “diary” for each episode would appear. These filmmakers are not only consummate professionals as far as camera-work goes, but are all adventurous souls who deserve to have their own stories told. In “The Great Salmon Run,” one cameraman swam with Grizzly Bears who were starving and trying to catch the salmon while he took footage of them doing it. Talk about nerves of steel. And in “The Great Tide” we saw an experienced underwater photographer get his flipper nibbled on by a shark. These people deserve our admiration for their courage and dedication to their craft.
If you are a nature lover or are simply captivated by the beautiful documentaries coming out in high definition these days, Nature’s Most Amazing Events should be on your list of DVDs to pick up. Each story is truly beautiful to behold. I can hardly wait to see what the BBC will do next.
–Fitz
p.s. Be sure to pick up Nature’s Most Amazing Events at Amazon below:
When I first saw the title and description for Every Picture Tells a Story, where art critic Waldemar Januszczak (The Sunday Times, U.K.) explores the history of eight different paintings from master artists such as Gainsborough, da Vinci, and Monet, I thought I would be taken on an interesting ride into art history. My eldest daughter has become very intrigued by different classical painters and techniques, and I hoped this would be something we could do together to learn about some of these masterpieces.
Though I know Januszczak is brilliant and knows his art, this has to be one of the driest explorations of art on record – at least for the casual art lover. He presents a ton of information about each painting, and does find some quite curious conspiracies and gossip about each of them. But he does it with such dry British wit that I found myself dozing off between segments. This DVD collection is meant for more serious lovers of art history than we currently have at my house.
That said, I have to say I was impressed with the depth each episode goes to for each painting. Not only does the host talk about the style of art itself, but about what was going on during the historical period of the painter, where the work was done, and in some cases what other artists and writers were doing during the period in question. And to spice it up a bit, he also relates some of the gossip surrounding each work.
Each episode is less than 25 minutes and Januszczak does his best to make sure the whole episode isn’t filmed inside a museum with shots of him and the painting. For example, when discussing Thomas Gainsborough‘s “Mr and Mrs Andrews,” he filmed segments from the tree which was in the background of the painting. It provided an interesting backdrop to the discussion of what was proper at the time and how the area has changed since the 18th century. And when discussing “The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Tulp” he traveled to the Netherlands and explored the locations where people would gather to watch autopsies for fun.
The eight episodes are on 2 DVDs and include discussions of “Mr and Mrs Andrews” (Gainsborough), “The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Tulp” (Rembrandt), “The Tempest” (Giorgione), “The Birth of Venus” (Botticelli), “Boy Bitten by a Lizard” (Caravaggio), “Mona Lisa” (Leonardo da Vinci), “Le dejeuner sur l’herbe” (Manet), and “The Arnolfini Marriage” (Jan van Eyck).
In addition to each episode, there is “The Rest of the Story”, which provides additional background on each episode in a Q&A format, as well as a biography for each artist and a booklet. The booklet includes a summary of each episode, with a image of the painting being discussed as well as a set of questions to consider, a list of other works discussed, and a bibliography for further investigation.
Every Picture Tells a Story was not my cup of tea, but I can definitely see its use as an educational aid for high school or college art classes. Januszczak has a firm grasp of the historical significance of each masterpiece and his love for the arts is evident. If you are an art student or teacher, I’d definitely recommend picking it up.
–Fitz
p.s. Pick up Every Picture Tells a Story at Amazon below!
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Add to that the many characters who call Sesame Street home – Bert and Ernie, Grover and the Grouch, Big Bird, Cookie Monster, Kermit, and the whole gang – and you end up with a snapshot of that wonderful world. Cosby, with his usual humor and style, manages to interact with them all and give us a walking tour of the street most kids across America (and around the world) know and love.
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