ironhorse_iv
Shot over the course of four years with a large film crew, on all seven continents, Winged Migration also known as The Travelling Birds takes its viewers on an aerial breathtaking trip, around the world, with its endless amount of footage of migrating birds. This film directed by Jacques Perrin is indeed, a feast for the eyes. It was shot using in-flight aerial cameras mount on ultralights aircrafts, paragliders and hot air balloon. This allows the viewers to fly alongside with the birds, in a fast, well-craft beautiful traverse appearance. I like that they were, able to capture, all these aerial shots, regardless how harsh, the weather was. It shows, how much hard work, went into this. I love the way, the movie covers vast distances; exposing over 590 miles of film to create an 89-minute piece. The footage shows both the beautiful, natural and man-made landscape of the planet, while also providing us, of a haunting image of our environment wrongs, such as pollution, over-hunting and wasting resources. This movie is flying high with critics. It's a visual masterpiece, but there are some flaws! Sadly, some of the visuals are somewhat choppy at times. One minute, you're looking at one bird, and then it cuts to another bird, in less than a second in frame. The film's lacks direction. It seems without reason at times, drifting between continents and species without that instinctual compass so vaunted in its subjects. Another thing, is that the film forgets stay somewhat grounded in reality. This so-call documentary is full of stage scenes that the filmmakers faked to garnering attention. Some of the footage is very excessive in the way, in how it wants to sensitize people, that it become somewhat annoying. Why would a flock of geese, be, hanging out a beat up truck in a desert? Another thing, are we supposed to believe, that a flock of geese would hang around, a noisy power plant? What the quack! That's kinda unrealistic. I get that the scene where the goose get stuck in a puddle of oil at the factory is supposed to be, an environment message guilt trip, but gees…it really look like it was staged as hell. No animal would bother going, even, near loud and heavy machinery. Anyways, the whole Exxon Valdez oil spill like scene wasn't even real. It was shot in a studio, and the oil was actually milk and vegetable dye with a train goose. The movie is full of scenes like this. Very well-edited scenes, to make the animals seem like they were in danger. The wild horses were in no way, near the geese, to trample them. The baby bird in its nest, was nowhere near, getting slice and dice by the agricultural machinery. The scene in which the injured bird is surrounded by crabs and, unable to fly away and escape, is fake as well. The filmmakers actually pulled the bird to safety before he could be attacked. And to their non-credit as documentarians, they left that part out and instead included a shot of the crabs eating some dead fish. They just cleverly edited the clips together to make you think that poor little bird got kill. The only scenes where birds honestly, probably got kill, are the hunting scenes, and the scenes where wild animals attacks. Other than that, it was very much a control upstage production. Much of the aerial footage was taken of "tame" birds. None of them, were really that wild. The filmmakers raised birds of several species from birth, so that the newborn birds would be imprinted on staff members, and were trained to fly along with the film crews. The birds were also exposed to the film equipment over the course of their lives to ensure that the birds would react the way the filmmakers want. Remind me of 1996's Fly Away Home in the way, they were able to pull this off. Sadly, this movie lies to us, as well. A lot of these birds fly over areas that they normally don't migration. While this film lacks logic in a documentary sense, it gives in to its imagination side, by allowing these birds, just to fly anywhere. While, this is really bad for a documentary, since logic will take you from place A to B; it's good for a movie, because imagination will take you anywhere. Still, it was very inappropriate for these avian animals to fly close and near national landmarks. They could had, gotten seriously hurt. I can't complain, too much, because those shots were indeed very beautiful. The film also states that no special effects were used in the filming of the birds, which is also kinda lying because there been a number of CGI segments that came up, by criticize, from the public. Many of those, are Earth space-like views. One thing that doesn't fly with me, is how much the movie lacks, narration and actual information. While, there is a few mumbles commentary, once in a while from director Jacques Perrin in the film, you never get to learn anything. The movie has more raucous honking and squawking from the animals than talking. The second-rate soundtrack by Bruno Coulais need some work as well. I hate that it cuts off, time after time in the film to bare silence. Honestly, the movie would have work, better with more relax, but inspirational well-known classical music, instead. Overall: This Oscar-nominated documentary film captures awe-inspiring moments, but it failed to live up to what it could've been. Still, it's not bad. It's pretty good. Duck, Duck, Goose! Tag, you're it! Don't feel like a caged bird; fly and get this movie. You will feel better, after watching it. I guarantee it.
sandeep_yadav20
Winged Migration really has some breathtaking photography of the actual flight of migratory birds. The close-ups are so vivid in motion that initially I thought that one of the birds in each group was carrying a camera attached to its body. Turns out, that is not the case and gliders were used. If you are accustomed to the documentaries on National Geographic or Discovery Channel, this film would seem to lack in certain respects. In both of those channels there is almost always a very descriptive narrative throughout nature based documentaries, whether it features birds, animals or insects. I do not hold that against Winged Migration. I feel that this film, in certain respects, establishes a sort of different genre of nature-documentary films. Human intervention has been left to the very bare minimum and the viewer is left to spin his own story around the visual. The narrative is occasionally used, but more often the name of the bird in a subtitle suffices. The sound, though, is different from the visual aspect. The intrusion of music is clear and very well defined. The choice of music too fits well with the sensibilities of the subject matter (and the particular scene). The end result is that the viewer feels he or she is actually on a flight alongside these dozens of different migratory birds flying across land and sea.Interesting Trivia - Check the fascinating Arctic Fern which flies some 12,500 miles twice each year, from the Arctic to Antarctic!Sandy, NY.x------------------------------------------xhttp://thetruthoath.blogspot.com/2008/05/idea-of-flight.html
ccthemovieman-1
Here is a beautifully-filmed documentary on the migration of birds. This movie took four years to make, and one can see why. You cannot get much closer, I would think, to the flying birds than what you see here. Cameras were literally attached to some of the birds so you, the viewer, are up there in the sky right with these (mainly) geese as they migrant thousands of miles.The colors are beautiful and the sound is good. However, be warned there is no dialog so it can be tough viewing the whole 90 minutes in one sitting. Also, I found the best and most interesting footage at the beginning.Nevertheless, this is a good addition to anyone's collection if or no other reason than the magnificent photography and the effort filmmakers put out to make this wildlife documentary. It also is interesting how they show different species every few minutes, where they go each year, how many miles they travel, the exact route, etc. Wildlife and bird-lovers in particular, should love this film.
