One Life

This documentary is just a collection of selected scenes/stories from the more comprehensive BBC series Life but is fantastic nevertheless even if you have already seen it on TV. For me the one standout was the narration by Daniel Craig and the very subtle music. Here in the US the TV show was narrated by Oprah Winfrey which was a disaster. You might not think of James Bond as a narrator for a nature documentary but Craig really did a great job on this one. He really conveys the astonishment and wonder that you feel watching these animals in his tone of voice but in a very playful way. And the music is very subtle and not too dramatic. In fact the total silence with no music and no narration in the scene with the Ibex climbing down the cliff is more powerful than if there was any. My favorite scene however is the one with the cheetahs on the prowl filmed head on, with the cats walking almost straight ahead towards the camera, it just conveyed a sense of power of the predators on their land. Highly recommended regardless of whether you watched the TV show or not.

This is a BBC Earth documentary narrated by Daniel Craig. These kinds of docs are starting to blend together. I've seen sections of this somewhere else. Wait! I think I've seen this one before without writing a review. That's one of the reasons that I started writing reviews years ago. I wouldn't be able to keep them all straight without doing that. Craig has a vaguely British accent. I can recognize his voice once I read the cast list. The fact is that if I can remember four or five of these animals, then this must be really good. The only deficiency is that they have very little tying them together. I guess the point is that we're all one world and that's what ties us all together. Duh!

From a technical aspect, this movie is amazing. I haven't seen such detailed cinematography filmed with dedication and pure talent. It must have been so hard to film all that, I just cannot imagine the effort. Sound is also great.

One Life is a beautiful documentary about animal life on Planet Earth. There were some really charming parts about the cycle of life showing animals that have caring and dedicated Mothers. I especially enjoyed the Snow Monkeys and the Brazilian Capuchin Monkeys. They were pretty cute and crafty in how they kept warm and fed. Another favourite part of mine were the Elephants marching towards water and the rock climbing goats.

Daniel Craig has a nice voice for narration and the scenery was breathtaking. I don't watch a lot Documentaries like this one, but I enjoyed it.

Over the last couple of years, a lot of documentaries on wild life and nature have been made by BBC. And we all know that no one does it better than them. When I heard that this new documentary, called 'One Life', would be in the movie theaters, I was immediately convinced. I just had to see it, and I'm quite sure millions of other people felt the same way. I am a huge fan of the amazingly popular and beautiful series 'Earth', so my expectations were quite high.

But I was slightly disappointed. What I saw was another collection of the most beautiful images of nature, another one and half an hour long stream of events. Predator vs. prey, mother and cubs, and what not. It was delightful to watch all the same, but it was far from original, it brought nothing new. That, however, is quite difficult, because there are so many documentaries. But why bother making another one? I haven't seen anything I haven't seen before on BBC's previous movie-making masterpieces.

Of course, if you haven't any experience when it comes to documentaries on nature, this is a very, very good one. It also focuses on trying to show how animals and humans are alike, how we are inevitably connected to the same things animals are, and what we both try to achieve.

I can recommend this to anyone who is not that familiar with documentaries. It is very good for children to watch, because it is very easy to understand. And on top of that; there are of course the amazingly beautiful scenes of nature. But if you have seen a lot more of these (say 'Earth'), then 'One Life' will probably not be worth the effort. [7/10]