The Living Planet - A Portrait of the Earth
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Movie Reviews of The Living Planet - A Portrait of the Earth
Movie Review: boadcast sequence
Summary: 5 Stars
ok, so the digital transfer isn't the best, time-warner has rearranged the presentation order and 25 years of scientific advancements have come to pass, the series is still as great as ever and the program's intent remains relevant ... now, to correct the one problem that can be corrected, here is the original broadcast sequence for those who would like to watch "the living planet" in it's original order ... enjoy:
1. "The Building of the Earth" - broadcast 19 January 1984
2. "The Frozen World" - broadcast 26 January 1984
3. "The Northern Forests"- broadcast 2 February 1984
4. "Jungle"- broadcast 16 February 1984
5. "Seas of Grass" - broadcast 23 February 1984
6. "The Baking Deserts" - broadcast 1 March 1984
7. "The Sky Above" - broadcast 8 March 1984
8. "Sweet Fresh Water" - broadcast 15 March 1984
9. "The Margins of the Land" - broadcast 22 March 1984
10. "Worlds Apart" - broadcast 29 March 1984
11. "The Open Ocean" - broadcast 5 April 1984
12. "New Worlds" - broadcast 12 April 1984
Movie Review: Hours of good stuff
Summary: 5 Stars
This set has hours of clean, educational material. I find it very relaxing to turn on my system and just let the discs play. There are 720 minutes (12 hours) of programming, so it's a great value.
In other reviews, I see a lot of concern for quality and sound. Yes, this is not some Hollywood HD-DVD fast-action movie in 3D. It's just a tour through the wonders of nature in our world. The quality is still very crisp and clean. There are no major artifacts or broken audio.
The content is very interesting. It's one of the few nature programs today without "tree-hugger drama". So many nature programs put up a front of teaching you about nature, but end up being a political show or a show about the scientists themselves. I personally think David Attenborough's approach of treasuring nature while we have it is much more effective.
I also think it is a great show for children. There are so many animals and regions of the world (cold forests, valcanoes, oceans, etc). It's a feast for young minds.
Movie Review: Not bad
Summary: 4 Stars
To bad it is not re-mastered, the DVD quality takes away from the content quality.Movie Review: OK, BUT NOTHING NEW
Summary: 2 Stars
David Attenborough is an extraordinary naturalist. Nonetheless, this series is lacking, not because of the content or Attenborough's presentation, but because it is so old. The DVD's are new, but the series is from the 1980's and therefore outdated. If that is OK with you, then go for it. Otherwise, I suggest you consider the "Life Series" by the BBC, Attenborough, and company from the Amazon UK site (Region 2 DVD's). Movie Review: Awesome!
Summary: 4 Stars
I originally saw the original U.S. run of The Living Planet on PBS back in the spring of 1985. I was absolutely mesmerized by this series. I was into all things natural history and filmmaking and this series did it for me! It still is my all-time favorite natural history series.
I recently purchased the R1 DVD set and am reliving those fantastic times I had when I watched it over 20 years ago. The information is still relevant although we can think back over 20 years to see how things have progressed from the time David Attenborough made this show.
I would have given the show 5 stars (absolutely nothing wrong with the content mind you) BUT someone decided to put the individual episodes on the discs in the wrong order!!!! Why in the world did they do this? The original show was presented in an order which made sense, for example, Attenborough begins with the Building of the Earth and then moves on to the high frozen mountains, then goes to the Northern Forests and subsequently into the jungles and then the grasslands, etc. In the R1 version of the DVD, they totally are out of order!!! Makes me sick to think that they actually came up with this idea. The original shows usually had a short teaser line by Sir David at the end of each episode indicating where we were going in the next episode, as a reviewer already stated before, these were edited out and the endings of the episodes come fast and just end. Just no excuse to do that.
But, what I am doing is watching them in the correct order to enjoy the episodes as they were meant to be seen.
One other thing, if you really want to enjoy this series, then find the book called The Making of the Living Planet by Andrew Langley. This book was published in 1985 and details all that went into the making of the series mostly from the cameraman's viewpoint. It has totally opened my eyes as to how they shoot these things and what specifically went into making the Living Planet. I will never watch it again in the same way now that I know the behind the scenes of it!