Tv Animal Programs

A

Ara

Well-Known Member
In my humble opinion, the best TV animal programs are those which do not include humans - the sort of thing that the BBC does so well.

Save me from the "jump on the crocodile" or "grab the snake's tail" type of show.

Having said that, however, I must mention a few honorable exceptions:
Anything with David Attenborough is, for me, extremely watchable. (He really is a senior primate in our order.)

Also, I will always watch the very dishy Dr. Charlotte Uhlenbroek. (That toothy smile, those beautiful eyes, that cute little ponytail! WOW!
 
David Attenborough's series are unrivalled as far as I'm concerned. He is the master at weaving a story which is sustained through a long series, and providing an erudite narration. His appearances on camera are restricted to situations in which they enhance a situation, by providing scale or as an aid to demonstrating behaviour for example. Looking forward to his next series on reptiles and amphibians coming next year.

Charlottle Uhlenbroek (as well as being easy on the eye) is another good pick, but she seems to have vanished from our screens recently apart from fronting a lame reality show, Safari School.

Simon King is another great presenter because like Attenborough he combines an obvious love of his subject with the ability to communicate the science and interpret behaviour. He's a great cameraman too (see the Planet Earth great white shark sequence).

I'm less inclined to watch presenter-led wildlife shows especially those in which the presenter can offer little more than pointing at things and saying 'Wow!' or 'Amazing!' (see also: Ben Fogle)

All my examples so far are from the BBC Natural History Unit which is IMHO unrivalled when it comes to big budget documentaries. There are many fantastic independent filmmakers such as Jeff and Sue Turner, Owen Newman and Amanda Barrett who make some of the award-winning shows that often turn up on Natural World in the UK.

I am critical of the BBC too. They always deliver stunning visuals but some of the recent output has suffered due to the most banal and clichéd scripts (eg Galapagos and Ganges).
 
I find Ben fogle to be quite annoying. He always asks tooo many questions which makes me wonder How much does he really know.

I loved the amazon programme that was on a few years back, where kate humble and an american diver decided to dive into the amazon in search of it's biggest fish.

I also like springwatch, and Prehistoric park. I've met Nigel Marven, and he really knows his stuff. He knew the castle that I'd seen wild wall lizards in Jersey.

My least favourite programme is presented by Austin Stevens, I find him to be a bit hard to watch.
 
god, Austin Stevens is a prick of a presenter. He always seems to think he's in an action movie or something, what with all the so-obviously-staged slow-motion shots of him wrestling completely-placid "wild" snakes, dream sequences (seriously!), and maybe-I'd-better-take-my-shirt-off-now-and-show-my-saggy-man-boobs moments. Good for a laugh but so hard to watch.

Give us Attenborough any day
 
I often watch a Belgium series called (I translate from Dutch) "Funny places". With a lot of BBC-documentaries. And David Attenborough is also my heroe...
 
to be honest i find it annoying when presenters ask the experts/zoo keepers lods of quesions like ben fogle and the roar presenters. the roar presenters have the excuse of that its a kids program and that their education the kids who are watching. kate humble knows her stuff and knows what shes doing whilst ben fogle doesnt seem to have a clue what hes doing most of the time.
 
A friend of mine who works at Whipsnade said that Rolf Harris and Pam St Clement were presenters who always put the welfare of the animals first while doing their programmes. If a keeper thought the animal would be distressed by being filmed, the shot was cancelled. He also said they are both very nice people.
 
Zoo Crew

does anyone know where or how i could obtain a copy of the Zoo Crew program that was on Australian television in january 2007?
 
Good news Attenborough fans: the king of wildlife TV has just been signed up for 2 new BBC series!

One is 'The Frozen Planet' which looks at life in the Arctic and Antarctic, produced by the same people as 'Planet Earth'. (Yet another excuse to get those emperor penguins and cute baby polar bears in front of a lens).

The other is called 'LIFE' and will tell the story of evolution. It will be broadcast in 2009 (the 150th anniversary of Darwin's Origin of Species).

I expect as he's getting on a bit his involvement will be to narrate rather than present in front of the camera.
 
he is doing his final 'life of ...' currently which is reptiles, as its the only major goup he has never presented on!
 
Yes and I hope they re-release the 'Life' DVD box set with Life in Cold Blood next year. Even at £100 it's got to be the best value DVD collection going!
 
does anyone know where or how i could obtain a copy of the Zoo Crew program that was on Australian television in january 2007?

Kelvin - you can purchase a copy of the Zoo Crew DVD from any Zooos Victoria properties giftshop (Melbourne Zoo, Healesville Sanctuary or Werribee Open Range Zoo)
 
that was such a great program! i recorded it, but want a dvd copy, jst to lazy to call zoo, and say plz send it to bathurst!
 
So, any other UK Zoobeaters enjoying Life in Cold Blood at the moment? I didn't catch the second episode but I'll watch the repeat on Sunday. I loved the first episode - Attenborough seems to be getting more playful in his old age! Highlight was the hunt for the pygmy leaf chameleon at the end of the programme - the joy on his face!
 
I've already used iPlayer to watch the whole of this year's Big Cat Diary and several episodes of Natural World - it's pretty good but I have had frequent problems with it stopping and starting every few seconds which can get quite frustrating in a 1 hour long programme! No, I'm going to take advantage of the Sunday teatime repeat and give Attenborough and his waving golden frogs my undivided attention!

The first episode got 10 million viewers if you include the repeat, which is the biggest UK audience for a documentary since....... Planet Earth, of course.
 
A friend recently lent me a 3 part series he had taped from television about 10 years ago called "Flight of the Condor", the most engrossing wildlife doco. I have ever seen!

It's British and not a BBC production, though it has a "BBC" feel about it.

I'm trying to find out if it's available on DVD. If it is, I MUST have it.

Anyone else seen it?
 
Lives in The Balance

I have an old vhs video of a documentary from Australia which shows how a whole pod of stranded pilot whales were moved (across land) to another bay so they could be saved....

I think it is called 'Lives In The Balance' or something like that.....don't know if it ever made it to DVD (prob. dates from the 80s).....:)

Worth a watch.....
 
At Amazon.com you can buy the 2DVD-set "Echo, and other elephants" from the BBC-series "Echo of the Elephants", and 5 other films. It includes:

Echo of the Elephants
Echo of the Elephants, the next generation
Echo of the Elephants, the final chapter?
Elephant nomads of the Namib Desert
Living with elephants
Namibia's desert giants
The search for Virgo
Elephants of Samburu.

362 minutes of African elephants!
 
Ara said:
A friend recently lent me a 3 part series he had taped from television about 10 years ago called "Flight of the Condor", the most engrossing wildlife doco. I have ever seen!

It's British and not a BBC production, though it has a "BBC" feel about it.

I'm trying to find out if it's available on DVD. If it is, I MUST have it.

Anyone else seen it?
Click to expand...

There is only one "Flight of the Condor" that I'm aware of, and that was indeed a BBC series. In fact, it was one of the BBC Natural History Unit's first big commissions following the success of Life on Earth. It is a 3 part series narrated by Andrew Sachs (better known as the actor who played Manuel in Fawlty Towers) and broadcast here in the UK in 1982. I've never seen it although old VHS copies can be picked up on eBay from time to time. It's never been released on DVD.

I'm eagerly awaiting the forthcoming pay-per-view service on BBC's iPlayer, which will allow us to download programmes from its archives! Not sure if this will also be available to folks outside the UK though...
 
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