Customer Reviews
By
Zev Toledano (REAL NAME)
Over the past two decades, the BBC Natural History Unit has become a prolific documentary factory of the highest order, with ever-improving skills and increasing dedication. Some of their productions are relatively minor, but this is one of their flagships, and you can tell this because they use David Attenborough as the narrator (who is still in top form). The theme for this 10-part series is the challenges of life and how various animals and plants solve them. This includes unusual and extreme food gathering techniques, hunting strategies, surprising evolutionary weapons and defenses, adaptations to harsh environments, mating rituals, and the le ngths they go to in order to pick the right breeding partners. Each episode covers this vast topic in specific areas: The first episode is an overview and top-20 hit parade of the upcoming episodes. Each of the ensuing episodes then cover a branch of the animal kingdom, including reptiles, insects, mammals, plants, birds, fish, with additional specialized episodes covering hunting, sea-life and primates. This will obviously overlap with many of their previous releases, especially The Trials of Life, Attenborough's series covering the animal kingdom, and even The Living Planet and Planet Earth. But their approach here is interestingly well-chosen: Previously covered footage and educational information is usually summarized, before continuing with the more obscure, the upgraded, and the exciting new details. For example, The Private Life of Plants is obviously much more comprehensive and educational, but this show's episode on plants features things like a 60-second time-la pse shot of growing life in the woodlands that took two years to create, new information on the strange shape of the Dragon's Blood tree, and more footage on the Venus Flytrap, this time its dual use of insects complete with tiny sound recordings. Now, I have a pet peeve about repetition. This show's annoyingly useless overview episode, and the fact that much of the information and footage lacks freshness and has been covered before, all tempt me to rate this show lower. But the combination of nicely summarized educational information, a good theme and structure, new amazing cinematography that uses the latest skills and technology, and some new exciting footage that I don't think I have ever seen before, compels me to give this top marks. This is a much better release than Planet Earth. In addition, while many nature documentaries have elements of drama and laughs, this show has more than usual, and you will find yourself frequently touched, horrified or very amused by al l of the amazing behaviour on screen, all obviously very real. The BBC also continue their recent trend that devotes the last 10 minutes of each episode to a 'making of' featurette. These are usually just as interesting as the footage and you can always stop watching if you aren't interested, so I suppose I can't complain. But keep in mind that if you subtract the overview episode and diary scenes, you are actually getting 450 minutes instead of 600. In summary: If you are relatively new to BBC documentaries, this will amaze you to no end AND provide a nice informative summary of life on earth. If you are a seasoned watcher of Attenborough's series, you can still enjoy this series as a combination of educational summary, a provider of new, complementary and upgraded information with some of the most beautiful, rare and amazing footage ever recorded, and even as a highly entertaining natural drama and comedy, or 'nature dramedy', if I may coin a phrase. However, if you pla ce emphasis on educational and more comprehensive information, Attenborough's previous Life series still reign supreme and will probably remain unequalled for a long, long time.
By
Wolfe H. Lewis (REAL NAME)
As a frequent watcher of nature programs over the last 30 years, I have to say that this is one of the all time greats. Attenborough docs are always solid and there's no shortage of the usual charm, but the filming techniques have really come to the fore on this effort. There are utterly spectacular moments in each of the episodes. Yes, the overview episode is redundant, but there's very little else to be critical about. One for the ages, this.
By
Brian A. Nichols (St. Louis, MO) (REAL NAME)
Ive watched the BBC Attenborough version and the first few episodes of the Discovery Oprah versions and as stated previously, the Attenborough narration is vastly superior. You can feel his passion for the subjects and years of experience expressed in every line. Discovery Channel must be commended for broadcasting the series to a broader audience but the alterations take away from experience. I highly recommend getting this BBC version. With the breathtaking camera work, narration, and score, this is a perfect companion to the Planet Earth series and should be part of any Blu-Ray collection.
I have seen the first two in this series in both the Attenborough and Oprah narrations. The Attenborough version is, of course, the better of the two. While there is a general idea (at least among American anti-intellectuals) that scientists are boring, uptight, fuddy-duddies, the truth is that the well-educated populizers of science, such as Attenborough, still hold a very dear place in the hearts of a very large group of people in America who have not yet gone bat guano crazy. The reason why a man like Sir David Attenborough is so well esteemed among enthusiasts of nature documentary, whereas Oprah Winfrey is not, is because when one devotes their entire life to the understanding of a certain topic they are able to bring a wonder-filled enthusiasm, backed by a substantial kn owledge, to that topic. Most of us are not looking for a "Wow...Look...nature is cool!" sort of commentary. We already understand that. We wish for someone to fill us with the wonder of understanding. The only thing that separates humankind from the animals in these documentaries is that we are truly *thinking* about them. Why stare, slack-jawed, as if nature were a train wreck while ludicrously under-qualified talk show hosts point and extrapolate the obvious when we can spend that time in awe while actually learning? This documentary is one of the finest ever made, but only the BBC version is worth consideration.
By
Wrek "Wrek" (Birmingham, AL)
If you enjoyed Planet Earth, you will love Life. Please be *very careful* to buy the BBC version that this review is written for. The other (US) version is unwatchable due to the US narrator chosen specifically for the US series.
By
Aubyn Stafford "Aubyn" (Atlanta, GA USA) (REAL NAME)
Even as an American from Georgia, I so much prefer the BBC version over the American version for one reason: David Attenborough. Oprah is nice, but I prefer to leave this to the seasoned professional. Attenborough has been with us nature lovers for decades (I can remember him from The Living Planet series) and he's still going strong! One can tell that this man really knows his stuff and is indeed fascinated by the material, not just as a passing whim, but a life long passion. He is a tr ue naturalist in an age in which that is a dying profession, and his enthusiasm for the wonder and complexity of life on earth is really made apparent with his narration. While others read words off a page, Attenborough lives the lives of the creatures themselves in the brief seconds during which they flash upon our screens.
By
B. Cromer (New York City) (REAL NAME)
BBC Video will be bringing four versions of Life to market. The original UK broadcast version narrated by David Attenborough will be available on DVD and Blu-ray. Similarly the Discovery version narrated by Oprah Winfrey will be available on both DVD and on Blu-ray. Each version has its own key art and clearly mentions the narrator on the front and back. Both contain loads of never-before-seen sequences and amazing photography and music and are organized along the same lines. We felt that in our networked world, there was no point in our trying to pick a single version for this marketplace. Instead we're giving every consumer the opportunity to own the version they want. Thanks!
My husband and I were appalled with Oprah's narration. So much so... I wrote an email to the Discovery Channel (when the show first Aired). I told, (who ever cared to read my email at Discovery), that the new documentary LIFE was simply VISUALLY magnificent,... but... ruined by Oprah's narration. I went on to tell Discovery... that Oprah is a lovely w oman. Does a great job with her talk show... but.... She "talked-down" to the audience as though we were 2 years old or nit-wits. And, said if the show was ever "re-narrated" I would purchase it. To my surprise, someone at Discovery Channel wrote back to me. This person said they were always pleased to receive feedback from their audience to make improvements. And thanked me for my comments. But, this person never told me there was a BBC version, narrated by the very talented David Attenborough. Hmmm... what's up with that? Out of curiosity, here on Amazon, I looked at the version narrated by Oprah. I was semi-surprised to see how many people felt the same as my husband and I. One woman wrote that she found out that the Discovery Channel (the American version) was re-written for Oprah. Why? I'm stunned! Why would the Discovery producers, screenwriters, etc. etc. not use David Attenborough's narration? Was it Oprah's idea to talk to the audience as though she were reading a bed time story to a small child. (Her "animated" sound effects were very irritating). One more comment... to those who have written that you can get "LIFE" DVD cheaper at Walmart or whatever.... I believe you are mistaken. The LIFE DVD's at those stores are NOT "Blue-Ray". Unfortunately, Blue-Ray cost more than regular DVD's.
The "Life" photographer who spent twenty-one 11-hour days in a hide deep in a rain forest to capture the first mating of the bower bird ever recorded on film deserved something better than Oprah's soporific drone of narration. And so I was delighted to see that, while the Netflix version of "Life" offered only Oprah, the version narrated by the wonderful David Attenborough was available on Amazon. Having w atched, eyes narrowing, two and a half discs of the Oprahfied series, I began anew with this version, and it was like watching a completely different series. Though he appears on camera in only a few clips from older series, Sir David, a Cambridge-trained naturalist, exudes an enthusiasm for his topics that makes this series, so exquisitely caught on film, really sing. Even if you already caught the Oprah version on TV, this version is well worth acquiring to watch. And it's a keeper - the intricacies of the animal world he points out are so magnificent, I know I shall watch this again and again.
By
Cary Gammalo "cratylus" (Rex, GA) (REAL NAME)
If you're going to buy th is Blu-Ray, make sure you buy the one narrated by David Attenborough and NOT the one narrated by Oprah Winfrey. I'm sorry, but anyone who's being honest will agree that Oprah Winfrey narrating a scientific program is distracting to the point of annoyance. Choosing the right narrator is of utmost importance for an educational series about science, and I'm sorry but her voice does not have an authoritative quality for scientific programming. Let's face it, Oprah is known for her daytime talk show so her voice naturally will make the listener think of that. Just a horrendous choice to narrate this wonderful series. What's next? A series on Earth's geology narrated by Jerry Springer? An anthology of cosmology and astrophysics narrated by Stone Cold Steve Austin? Or perhaps a documentary on biological evolution narrated by Vince Shlomi the ShamWow guy? Let's face it: David Attenborough IS educational nature programming.
| ![Life (David Attenborough-Narrated Version) [Blu-ray]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51McC7ODtwL.jpg._SL300_.jpg)
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