Documentaries can be a hard sell, especially when they’re covering nature, as this is subject matter that has been covered time and again.  So when the BBC decided they were going to do one on a grand scale, they had their work cut out for them.  How could they do this documentary differently and what would they cover?  How about the diversity of our great oceans?  What about the untamed plains of Africa?  Why not choose to film our planet’s least-explored environments; caves?  In the end, the BBC covered each of these environments and many, many more. 

Film 

David Attenborough takes the helm in the narrator’s seat as viewers are guided through a 9-hour journey of our great planet.  There are a total of four discs to bring the compilation home to your trusty Blu-ray players and the content that was provided does not disappoint.  Should I go through each episode, which average around 45 minutes each, I would have a small book by the time I finish.  Instead, I will touch on a few of the highlights and list below what content you can expect to find on each disc:

Disc 1

From Pole to Pole

Mountains

Fresh Water

Disc 2

Caves

Deserts

Ice Worlds

Disc 3

Great Plains

Jungles

Shallow Seas

Disc 4

Season Forests

Ocean Deep

How does Planet Earth differ from other nature documentaries?  Well, for one there is no other compilation that can even come close to this in terms of variety of content as well as the sheer volume of footage.  To give you an idea, Planet Earth took 40 cameramen to shoot in over 200 locations around the globe.  All in all, these folks were in the field for over 2,000 days and their efforts paid off tremendously.

Some of the episodes I found most fascinating were that of “Caves,” “Jungles” and “Ocean Deep.”  The number of different creatures that reside in these environments and the environments themselves are truly sights to behold.  However, the other episodes certainly aren’t lacking in magnificence either.  In one particular episode, we find a pack of lions, starving, unable to make a kill, resort to an act of desperation…they target an elephant as their next prey.  Both animals typically live in close proximity to one another in an uneasy balance.  Yet, when push comes to shove and survival is the name of the game, animals and people will go to great lengths to stay alive and these lions were no exception.

Video 

Planet Earth is a paradox when it comes to video quality.  This series offers some of the best and worst that Blu-ray has to offer while delivering the 1080p resolution in a VC-1 encode.  Overall, it is a beautiful piece of work interspersed with scenes of very obvious grain.  There is a small amount of footage shot with infra-red cameras so don’t expect high quality here.  With that being said, it is important to keep in mind that this is no fault of the crew or transfer.  Infra-red footage is what it is…a means of capturing images at night.  It was never meant for entertainment purposes.  Nevertheless, other night and lowlight scenes using traditional shooting were sometimes heavier in grain than a loaf of wheat bread.

One such example that stands out was an overhead shot in the desert of a wind-swept dune casting a shadow to its right.  The sunlit sand looked beautiful.  In the shade were annoying specs, dancing about as if to taunt the viewer that their viewing experience would not be flawless.  However, the beauty outweighs the grit and beauty is something plentiful throughout Planet Earth. From the footage captured of a never-before-seen-on video big cat in Siberia, to the lush mountainsides of Borneo, your eyes will most certainly feast upon Mother Nature’s creations.

Audio 

It is a bad idea to watch an action film and then follow it up with a documentary, only to compare the audio between the two.  Planet Earth, you will find, is not heavy on utilizing the rear speakers.  However, it is quite the surround-sound experience to watch the “Caves” episode during the periods without narration while bats fly about the cave ceiling as you hear the flutter of their thin-membrane wings right behind you.  The other episodes utilize similar effects as well.

The center speaker delivers Mr. Attenborough’s narrative but just when I thought I had my speakers calibrated, I had to fine-tune them for this film…don’t worry, it’s not a big undertaking to do this (if you’re not familiar with manipulating the speakers).  It was very difficult to pick up the dialogue clearly at first.  I was a little put off by this after some time.  Make no mistake; I wasn’t comparing the audio of this with the action film at this point.  It really was just a task to hear what was being said.

Special Features 

There are no special features in this documentary.  Maybe a little something here would have been better than nothing.  Then again, maybe the crew is like me and thinks that if you can’t put it in 1080, don’t bother including it.

Final Thoughts 

In no other documentary is the circle of life so visible.  The rare creatures that most people have probably never seen, not only draw in the interest of the viewers, but educate them as well.  This is certainly a series the whole family can watch together, which is something you can’t say much these days for other titles.  Sit back and enjoy a journey that circumnavigates the globe, as you will witness scuba divers in perilous underwater caves, the evolution of the animals of the Galapagos and the beauty of the mighty sequoia, just to name a few of the stops along the way throughout the great Planet Earth.