Earth Flight (2011)

Directed by: John Downer | 312 minutes | documentary | Voice over: David Tennant

Man has always dreamed of conquering the skies. Although we have partly succeeded in this thanks to the technical ingenuity of a number of clever minds, the birds are still the best and most inspiring examples of creatures that have mastered the art of flying purely with the help of their own body power. Moreover, our aircraft are nowhere near as good as the maneuverability and diversity that are so characteristic of the bird flight phenomenon. Perhaps that is why there are a relatively large number of dedicated bird watchers who, on days off, look for nature with their binoculars and photo cameras in all kinds of weather. The six-part BBC crown jewel ‘Earthflight’ enables the viewer to experience the world through the eyes of our feathered fellow creatures for once. Each episode covers one or two continents and shows us characteristic landscape features, human structures and cities of international importance from a bird’s eye view. The first episode zooms in on North America, piggybacking on the backs of migratory snow geese (incredibly tough rascals who make epic journeys of over 4,000 miles each year), brown pelicans and the ever-aesthetic bald eagles. In particular, the aerial images, where imposing panoramas of leaping devil rays (almost appearing to float), hunting bottlenose dolphins, horseshoe crabs besieging the beach en masse and the remains of the once mighty North American bison herds pass the viewer’s eye. are of breathtaking beauty. Absolutely stunning are the razor-sharp shots of hunting red-tailed hawks, graceful aerial acrobats who know the art of plucking even agile guano bats from the sky.

In the remaining episodes you can enjoy mighty Andean condors and colorful macaws in their natural environment (South America), cranes, geese and storks during the annual bird migration (Europe), diligently fishing African sea eagles, millions of flamingos that transform alkaline salt lakes into hectometers wide pink surfaces and gracefully floating on the thermals vultures (Africa), swallows that visit the Great Wall of China and the illustrious Forbidden City, Chinese cranes joined in a moment of rare harmony by foxes and sea eagles (Asia) and the probably largest flock of budgerigars that has ever been seen by human eyes (Australia). Interestingly enough, the focus is not exclusively on the winged protagonists, but we can also get a nice view from the air at, among other things, fishing grizzly bears, eating tigers, white sharks rising from the turbulent seas and migrating wildebeest and zebras, herbivores that constantly watch. and be harassed by the hungry king of beasts. The series also makes it clear that many birds deliver performances that even the fittest elite athletes among us can still enjoy. For example, on their annual journeys from India or Pakistan to Central Asia and vice versa, Indian geese have to conquer the mighty Himalayas, an ordeal that takes the animals to dizzying heights of some seven thousand meters. In order to be able to stay at such high altitudes for a long time, the body of a bar-headed goose (also called stripe-headed goose) is adapted in various ways to make strenuous efforts in high air layers. Bar-headed geese can limit heat loss even under the most icy conditions, while the high oxygen affinity of the hemoglobin in their blood also enables them to efficiently absorb sufficient oxygen in extremely thin air.

The great man behind ‘Earthflight’ is the well-known filmmaker and writer John Downer. The Brit has often used groundbreaking technical gadgets to collect those intimate images that give his films a unique character. Downer has previously caused a furore with special documentaries about Bengal tigers, African elephants and polar bears, films for which he used cameras disguised as tree trunks, dung heaps and snowballs to get very close to these illustrious animals. The film footage in ‘Earthflight’ was created using modern HD cameras (sometimes placed on the backs of partially domestic birds), gliders, drones, helicopters crammed with film equipment and ultralight motorized aircraft. The making of the documentary took no less than four years, a time frame in which forty countries were visited and more than a hundred bird species were captured on film. The result of all this diligent work is an exuberant viewing feast for the true nature lover. And chances are you will never look at birds the same way again after watching this series.