by: SHERVIN AZAD ARYA The endangered genre of difficult to produce, in-depth, long format natural history films with cameraman behind the scenes and the scientific approach at the core of storytelling is finally being put to rest in its last bastion and place of birth; the BBC Natural History Unit. In its place, we will be seeing a culmination of manufactured trends for promoting a dumbed down, unwatchable, utterly slow and cheap films featuring unbearable, non-expert presenters/clowns. This is the next worse thing in the evolution of the character driven ONLY storytelling; easy to produce productions of no depth, with no archival value or long-term relevance that have completely squeezed proper natural history films from the spectrum of productions in the past decade. The irrelevant and uninteresting expressions on the face of a non-expert entertainer/clown is not why most turn to serious natural history films, but to be moved by complexity of a scientific subject matter and letting the wonders of the natural world be the ultimate entertainment. A non-expert presenter, if used, is simply a go-between, not the whole subject matter or the reason the film is or isnt entertaining and should not be used as a cover for lack of production values and talent in producing content. It follows that if I see a fantastic production exhibiting great talents in form and content, I will automatically be driven to find out more about its behind the scene creators. I dont need to necessarily see them on screen for half the duration of the films making irrelevant comments of no value or depth. This also neglects a growing and frustrated niche of viewers who want to see serious, in-depth scientific films, since almost every major film or series that is promoted to the top these days are a dumb down version of middle school biology that cant be watched once, let alone a long-term impact for the cause of the natural world. The decision by BBCs renown Natural History Unit to continue in the footsteps of a dismal industry that has degraded Discovery and Animal Planet networks, to name a few, to utterly unwatchable outlets of slowness, seeds the further degradation of the natural history films for the coming decades. Funds will be poured into series that would naturally appeal to a programmed craving of masses for shallowness and construct entertainment values instead of countering the trends that views a scientific approach and a scientist on screen as an inherent problem and a dumb down entertainer presenter substitute as a solution. Its so fortunate that during the window of time spanning the creation of the BBCs Natural History Unit until the time David Attenborough would retire, the world had a chance to see the golden era of priceless science driven natural history films with far more reaching effects than all the recent and upcoming entertainment films combined - the likes of which may never be repeated again. telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/bbc/10952692/BBCs-new-wildlife-presenter-rejects-scientific-approach-of-Sir-David-Attenborough.html
Posted on: Tue, 08 Jul 2014 16:37:27 +0000
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