Microcosmos
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Movie Reviews of Microcosmos
Movie Review: Nothing micro about this nature documentary!
Summary: 5 Stars
The name itself is quite an oxymoron mostly because there is nothing micro about this grand, high quality movie. There are no actors and special effect as nature takes front stage and manages to impress, captivate and astound the viewer. There is very little talking involved as Kristin Scott Thomas narrates quickly in the beginning and lets the music takes over to the beat of the Earth itself.
From the beginning I was transported back to the meadows of Poland where I spent many happy warm childhood days on my grandparent's farm in the summer. The red poppies, filed flowers, birds and animals were both familiar and foreign at the same time. The incredibly detailed close-ups and ultra sharp picture quality made every grass strand sway and dance in the wind, each water droplet glisten, each feather, tentacle and grain of sand was in high display as if in a museum for everyone to admire.
The day in the life of a bug on a French meadow, in the ponds and sandy plateaus was incredible to watch. The struggles for survival and their daily grind was shown in a rather beautiful light with pleasurable disposition. I felt an intimate connection with Mother Nature as I got a glimpse of uninterrupted life of the many beautiful and complex creatures that cover out planet and form such a huge part of the eco system. Their life and death goes unnoticed yet their vital role is really wonderfully portrayed in Microcosmos with careful and painstakingly filmed moments which reveal so much in depth information that it can be mind boggling at times. These tiny titans live and fight, love and reproduce even when some of those insects only have a twenty four hour life span they still make the most of it. I love the snails; ants, salamanders; even the scary spiders and beetles, ladybugs, millipedes and dozens of other mini masters of our planet roam around and live almost unnoticed right under our noses.
Movie Review: Cast of Characters
Summary: 5 Stars
This is a terrific movie. You can read the other reviews for details. However, my wife complains that, because there is almost no narration, you don't know which bug is which.
In fact, in the credits at the end of the movie, they list the "cast of characters" in order of appearance. But, the list is in French. So I translated it, below.
Cast of Characters, in order of appearance.
The Seven-Spot Ladybug
The Machaon Butterfly
The Inchworm (Measuring worm) Caterpillar
The Bee gathers nectar from a Sage Flower (butiner=gather nectar or pollen)
The Great Forked-tail Caterpillar
Snails of Burgundy
The new-born Caterpillar of the Jason Butterfly
Yellow and black Spider, genus Argiope (perhaps Argiope frelon or banded garden spider Argiope trifasciata)
The Bombyle (bee-fly, untranslateable)
The processionary caterpillars
Red ants
Harvester ants
Paper wasps (genus polistes)
The sacred beetle (dung beetle)
The pheasant
Water striders/water skaters (Family Gerridae)
Backswimmers, family Notonectidae (swimming upside down under water near surface)
The Spider Argyronète (fashions a diving bell from threads of silk)
Agrion damselflies (family Coenagrionidae?)
The bee Eucera in love with the Orchid Ophrys
The carnivorous plant Drosera
The rhinoceros beetle
The Millipede (Myriapod)
The kite stag-beetles (beetles fighting)
The Bucéphales caterpillars (eating leaves)
Conehead Mantis (Empusa pennata), juvenile form looks like a stick
The Great Peacock of the Night Butterfly
The Cousin Mosquito completing his metamorphosis
Movie Review: Magnificent film for the bug-lover in all of us
Summary: 5 Stars
"Microcosmos" may just be the perfect cure for arachnophobia. Never have bugs (at least the non-Pixar bugs) ever been so fascinating and adorable.
And this comes from someone who has had a life-long case of the heeby-jeebies when it comes to bugs, thanks to a demented older brother and a gallon-jug full of carpenter ants.
"Microcosmos" brings bugs into your home in the most enjoyable manner possible - in lush widescreen. The filmmakers take great care to emphasize the beauty and variety of the bug world, although they show us plenty of bugs we have seen in our own back yard. Sure, we'd be shocked at what you might find in Costa Rica or Madagascar, but this film reveals the glories that can be found etched in the wings of an everyday moth, the engineering genius of an underwater spider, and the defenseless innocence of an ant colony facing a hungry pheasant.
The filmmakers are smart, however, to keep most of the "violence" in the film relatively tame. No trapdoor spiders leaping out to snag friendly ladybugs, no preying mantises devouring mates. Instead we see stag beetles going buggo-a-buggo, to little effect. This is a movie that revels in the beauty that is the insect world, not its horrors. No tarantulas - hooray!
This is one of the great family movies - the kids will love it, and the adults will be fascinating by it. Like BBC's "Planet Earth" or the heavenly "Winged Migration," this is required viewing if you have ever been fascinated or disgusted by a bug.
Movie Review: Mesmeric, beautiful, astonishing
Summary: 5 Stars
In similar vein to Reggio's seminal Koyaanisqatsi, Microcosmos is a film without commentary, other than a one-sentence introduction and a few poetic words at the close. It presents the viewer with a gorgeous series of tableaux starring the amazing micro-fauna occupying a meadow. I guarantee the first thing that springs to mind when viewing Microcosmos for the first time is "how did they film that?!!" Achingly beautiful close-ups of ants, caterpillars, butterflies, snails, ladybirds, the bizarrely alien-looking mantis and dozens more give us an unique insight into the oft-ignored world beneath our feet.
The whole 72 minutes is one great therapeutic trip - just sit in your comfiest chair and let the vivid colours and sumptuous sound (natural insect noises occasionally punctuated with minimalist ambient music) wash over you.
Favourite scenes include the sissyphus-like dung-beetle, the ants at the "waterhole", the snail lovers, the spider's "aqualung", the stag beetles' battle and the jaw-droppingly stunning finale of the nascent mosquito breaking free of the meniscus of the pond on its impossibly long legs. Even the moment of microcosmic horror, when a strangely prehistoric looking pheasant perpetrates some genocide, is magnificently filmed and utterly satisfying.
Possibly the first wildlife film to cross the boundary into pure art.
I guarantee you will feel a better and more harmonious person for having viewed Microcosmos.
Movie Review: Go to the Ant, Thou Sluggard!
Summary: 5 Stars
My first viewing of Microcosmos left me enchanted. It also left me feeling as if I'd emerged from an hour in a hot tub, and I slept like a baby. The enchantment and the deliciously soporific effect kicked in immediately with Viewing Two, and other impressions began to form as well. Impressions of gentle hilarity; of existential horror; of earthly abundance that-like fractile geometry-moves you closer to infinity the closer you look. "Go to the ant, thou sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise." [Proverbs VI:vi.] Why, I often wonder, are we always so compelled to draw human lessons and morals from observations of Nature and her creatures? Why must we always anthropomorphize the creatures instead of taking them according to their own mysterious natures? Well, watching the scene of the mating snails makes me surrender these objections. Nakedness and tenderness can't have much more to teach us than they do in this encounter and delicate mutual exploration. The fact that the snails wind up rolling over into the grass is just a bonus!
The score for this film is perfectly inspired by and wed to its subject. A few words, a few bars of music, a vast silence. Brilliant.
Despite the fun it is to watch this film, I rarely watch it. Like food cravings, Microcosmos lets you know when it's time to watch. And then it's completely satisfying. After you've seen it, you'll never walk through grass the same way again.