DVD Reviews

Life - Blu-ray Review

By Jeff Swindoll Jun 3, 2010, 13:36 GMT

From the BBC and the Discovery Channel, producers of Planet Earth and The Blue Planet: Seas of Life, comes the newest landmark natural history series, Life. In Planet Earth, we brought you the world as you’ve never seen it before. Now, get closer with Life. Four years in the making, filmed over 3000 days, across every continent and in every habitat, with breathtaking new high definition filming techniques developed since ...more

The world is an amazing place.  We’ve been looking into it since before Walt Disney created his nature series.  The BBC Natural History Unit and the Discovery Channel looked at Planet Earth and now they’ve turned their gaze towards “life” and once again offer their magnificent view.  

This is not the first rodeo of either the BBC Natural History Unit or the Discover Channel.  Life and Planet Earth have some similarities in that they’ve been released in two different versions. 

One is more geared towards the British and features narration by Sir David Attenborough, the other is aired on the Discovery Channel and jettisons the sonorous tones of Sir David for Oprah Winfrey.  We might argue that the Discovery Channel version is dumbed down a bit.  What can’t be argued is that either way you’re getting a fantastic eleven episode documentary. 

It took four years to shoot the footage contained in those episodes, across numerous continents, and done with high definition cameras to capture every breathtaking detail.  In fact, many places that the production goes to have never been filmed before and some of the cameras used have been developed just for this documentary.  Also cameramen and crew took their life [insert rimshot here] and limb into their own hands as they go on an international hunt for some of these elusive creatures. 

The episodes include “Challenges of Life,” which begins our journey and looks at the hunting techniques and hunting methods of many species across the globe.  “Reptiles and Amphibians” covers some of the oldest creatures on the planet.  “Mammals” follows suit covering that group.  “Fish” dives beneath the oceans and uses high tech cameras to capture behavior that could not be filmed before. 

“Birds” takes to the skies to observe those flying wonders.  “Insects” takes to the ground and below to zoom in on these fascinating bugs.  “Hunters and Hunted” goes back mammalian and the circle of life.  “Creatures of the Deep” goes to the depths to view that life is not hindered by the pressures of this hostile environment. 

“Plants” focuses on our seemingly sedentary greenery that is more active than imagined.  “Primates” focuses on monkeys and apes – our ancestors depending on your thoughts on creation.  The eleventh episode is a making of so look for it in special features.  

Life is presented in a 1080i high definition transfer (1.78:1).  Special features are in high definition with the most notable being the 42 minute “The Making of Life” found on disc four.  Each disc also features “On Location” mini-documentaries that total 100-minutes of footage.  Disc four also features 18 minutes of deleted scenes.  

You might think that you’re living life and don’t need to see a documentary on it.  Au contraire, as the makers of Planet Earth have once again provided a fascinating look at our environment.  It’s both educational and high entertaining, no matter which version you choose (I’m still partial to the British version). 

Both offer fantastic high definition footage of the living things that inhabit our world.  

Visit the DVD database for more information.