Human Planet

Following in the footsteps of the two most-successful documentaries in the BBC’s history, “Planet Earth” and “Life”, “Human Planet” is an eight-part series that explores the relationship between human beings and nature. Aired originally in January 2011, “Human Planet” is an ambitious project and a daredevil filmmaking exercise. The filmmakers have gone above and beyond to cover every aspect of Mankind’s interaction with nature. They travelled to remote, dusty, barren lands; climbed far-off, snowcapped mountains; sailed on violent seas; and filmed near deadly volcanic eruptions. In the process, they risked their lives. Clearly, their hard work--in spite of several challenges along the way--makes this series a unique experience that merits its own place among other successful nature documentaries.

The series is based on capturing moments of humans hunting for food, braving stormy weathers, and surviving in hard climatic conditions. In addition, each episode is a collection of eight-to-ten short stories of people in various parts of the world. Through the episodes, we learn that humans are highly adaptable and the most-dominated species living on Earth. The relationship of humans with marine life begins with the shore, and in the first episode, “Oceans,” we are taken right to the heart of the action. Here, we see two men battle the stormy waves close to the beach, trying to capture Goose barnacles--a species that lives on rocks close to the seashore. Following this, we see a team of fishermen trying to hunt a whale in the Indonesia archipelago. It’s an eighteen-hour battle that begins with meticulous planning and precise execution.

We also meet the Pa-ling divers in Philippines. Here, drivers plan a unique mechanism to capture a fish that can result in an instantaneous death. The divers descend to about forty meters of water, and then they methodically lay out a huge ball of net. Any wrong move and the divers might find themselves trapped in the net, battling for their lives. At these depths, they also run the danger of suffering from the decompression sickness called “the bends.” Each hunting trip fetches the Pa-ling divers about 50% of fish from the reef, and they do this twice a day. At this rate, within the next fifty years, all the fish will be gone. Whether it is offshore or in a sea, these examples demonstrate humans’ unmatched skills to understand and navigate in deep oceanic waters. Evidently, these qualities make humans stand out from other species.

Oceanic waters are extremely difficult to tame, and humans have found a way to love these waters by being incredibly adaptable. We meet the Bajau people in the Coral Sea near Borneo. People in this part of the world live in houses created on the sea. In fact, they are so satisfied with their lives in the small boathouses that some of them have never seen land. Moving away from the gigantic seas, we are taken to the dusty lands of the Sahara desert in the episode “Desert.” The scarcity of water in this desert pushes the local tribe to do something unbelievable. Using no modern equipment, the tribesmen are able to locate water in the driest of places. Grouping together like a professional team, they build small channels of water that will eventually be the source of their survival in the long run. Their ultimate success demonstrates their immense navigational skills in locating water; and it’s a monumental achievement for their tribe.

Moving along, we are taken to the frozen Arctic zone in the episode “Arctic.” The Igloos in Greenland navigate to deep trenches of the seabed to find mussels--a special type of creatures living in shells. The seabed filled with water is now frozen for Igloos to excavate inside, but they only have thirty minutes to get as many mussels as they can gather before the tides are back in the frozen area. The Igloos are quick in getting their picks, which shows their diligence in understanding the timings of the sea tides.

In the “Jungle” we witness the Korowais tribe displaying an amazing act of house building on a treetop. First in the forest they identify a cluster of trees where they will build the house. With no safety net or equipment, the men quickly climb the trees and start the process of chopping them down to create a foundation for the house. The tribesmen are amazingly swift, and the filming crew had a tough time in keeping up with the pace. Once the house is built, the tribe celebrate the occasion by ceremoniously lighting a fire in the tree house (talk about safety regulations to these men). Nonetheless, the Korowais tribe displays astonishing engineering skills with their exceptional understanding of the surrounding landscape.

In “Mountains” we are taken on a trip where an eagle is hunting the fox in a traditional Kazak style in Mongolia. And then we meet the avalanche busters in the Swiss Alps, where a team is deploying explosives to deliberately create an avalanche; this is done to ensure that skiers are safe and that unforeseen avalanches don’t leave a trail of dead bodies.  In “Grassland” we see local tribesmen planning a heist to steal food from a lion’s pride in Kenya. I was amazed at how humans outwitted the lions by stealing their food; from a lion’s perspective, the humans have conducted a highway robbery. Amazingly, no one in the tribe was attacked by the hungry lions.

I liked how the filmmakers laid out the format of the documentary. Every episode flows logically, when you consider the vastness and diversity of the Earth’s landscape. The filmmakers have gone to great pains to bring us the dynamic interaction of the humans and nature. In spite of all the odds, the humans through their intelligence have succeeded in their game of survival. Be it unbearable weather conditions or unfriendly landscapes, the human race has always found ways to outperform other life forms on this planet. Survival and dominance form the integral aspects of the human race. Humans are natural hunters, and the documentary succeeds in presenting a few deadly hunting expeditions in remote regions around the world. Beautifully photographed, “Human Planet” offers a number of breathtaking locations, showing the Earth’s most-beautiful facets. It’s been an arduous task for the filmmakers to reach out to these locations, and in some cases, they risked their lives doing so.

It is easy to by impressed by the picturesque shots of Earth and its inhabitants. However, I found “Human Planet” to be a bit inconsistent, marred by some pacing issues and a few questionable locations. First, in the episode “Rivers” we see the violent Ganges River trashing the coastline, and the residents close to the shores have only a few minutes to move their homes. Among other segments, this segment confused me a lot. The filmmakers have omitted the biggest religious gathering in the world, along the coast of the Ganges, called the Maha Kumbh Mela, in which about sixty million people from all over India and other countries come to pay their respect to the holy Ganges. Whether this omission was due to other reasons or due to the timing of the gathering, we will never know for sure. In addition, we don’t get any insights on how the Buddhists live in the Himalayas, although there is a segment showing a cremation as per Buddhism. They live in the harshest conditions with no easy access to food and water. More so, they can only eat certain types of meats. It would have been an interesting segment to include. In addition, the lack of any bonus features makes it difficult to understand the reasoning for picking the filming locations.

Second, I felt the main focus of the film was on the hunting aspect, in which we see humans hunting for fish, snakes, bats, spiders, monkeys, whales, sharks, and so on. There is no doubt that these segments provide excitement and thrills for our viewing experience, but it’s overdone. Humans are primarily shown as carnivorous, and there are several well-documented cases of humans not resorting to meat eating, even in the worst survival conditions. As such, these segments don’t give us a complete picture.

Third, there are a number of segments that only act as fillers. For example, the flirting game in “Desert,” the fox hunting in “Mountains,” the Moroccan tannery in “Cities” are all fillers that affect the pacing of the film. If the filmmakers can show the significance of pigeon droppings on the Moroccan leather industry, then why not show how cow manure drives the energy engine in rural India? Finally, the film is inconsistent in its message about environment. I give credit to the filmmakers for staying neutral while documenting this, but on a few occasions, they can’t keep a lid on it. In the episode “Oceans,” for instance, we are told that all the fish will be gone in fifty years, but no solution is offered to mitigate this problem.  Similarly, the loggers in “Jungle” cut down trees at an alarming rate, but when we get to the final episode, “Cities,” we are quickly reminded about our consumption rate and the waste it generates, and that something needs to be done sooner. It’s a rare misfire in the narration, but it nevertheless sends out mixed signals about how to preserve our environment.

Still, “Human Planet” is a testament to human capabilities amidst tough survival conditions; adaptability, perseverance, intelligence are some of the qualities that make humans a dominant race. In the end, the documentary should be seen to understand the daily struggles of people in search of food, people who have only limited resources at their disposal.

Video:

BBC presents this documentary in an aspect ratio of 1.78:1, using a VC-1 encode. The 1080i transfer looks really crisp and beautiful, similar to what we have seen in the previous BBC documentaries “Planet Earth” and “Life.” The deepwater shots are amazingly clear, with deep blues. In the jungles, the greens are predominantly bold and vibrant. The panoramic shots of the Mongolian mountains and the Sahara Desert--against the backdrop of clear blue skies--leaves a lasting impression about the Earth’s beauty. The close-ups of animals and people are packed with amazing details; the shots are consistently sharp and clear. In addition, the skin tones are faithfully represented. In the end, nature is perfectly preserved in this 1080i transfer.

Audio:

Warner has included a 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio track for this release. Of course, as a nature documentary, the film does not feature loud explosions or high-pitched sounds. John Hurt’s narration matches to Richard Attenborough’s voice in “Planet Earth” and “Life” in that it is calm and packed with elderly wisdom. Mostly, the sound is presented through the front channels, and Hurt’s narration is clear and deep throughout. The rear channels are activated during the hunting sequences. The serene moments feature atmospheric noises that are perfectly rendered by this track.

Extras:

At the end of each episode, we get a ten-minute “making-of” segment. Each segment explores camera positions, the filmmakers’ interaction with locals, the difficulties they faced, and how they photographed landscape shots. In some instances, the crew had to find alternative ways to shoot, as shooting with modern equipment seemed improbable.

We also get two additional segments, each running for ten minutes. In “Fez” we are taken to a Moroccan tannery, where employees are working with pigeon droppings that will be applied to leather products. We see the layout of the pits: lime and several color pits. Following this, in “Volcano” we see the crew in the Kawah Ijeh volcano in East Java to film the Indonesian workers mining the sulfur rocks. It is a daring task to go inside the jaws of death that are spewing deadly gases capable of inflicting long-lasting health hazards.

Parting Thoughts:

“Human Planet” is a companion piece to “Planet Earth” and “Life.” It is a beautiful-looking documentary that is highly educational and entertaining at the same time. Apart from a few missteps, “Human Planet” succeeds at all levels in representing the delicate marriage that exists between the humans and nature. As the narrator, John Hurt, rightly says:  “How we adapt in the future remains to be seen?”

Video = 9/10

Audio =9/10

Extras = 6/10

Film Rating = 8/10