Life—BBC Earth (Blu-ray)

Movie: 5
Picture/Sound: 4.5/4
Extras: 3

Four years in the making, filmed over 3000 days, across every continent and in every habitat, with breathtaking new high definition filming techniques not available for "Planet Earth", "Life" presents 130 incredible stories from the frontiers of the natural world, 54 of which have never been filmed before. Packed with excitement, revelation and entertainment, this remarkable 11-part blockbuster, narrated by Oprah Winfrey, captures unprecedented, astonishingly beautiful sequences and demonstrates the spectacular and extraordinary tactics animals and plants have developed to stay alive.

I love these new nature documentaries that have been coming out. I wish we would have had stuff that was this interesting when I was young. Sure I loved some of the wild kingdom stuff, but the BBC Earth stuff showcases some of the coolest wildlife photography I’ve ever seen and manages to stay captivating throughout. You can find this series in two forms with the difference being the narrator. If you love nature documentaries, this is a must have!

The video presentation is very similar to Planet Earth but with some minor improvements. Planet Earth was shot with digital cameras but I don’t think they were of the same quality as what you have here. Detail is a bit more consistent here and I didn’t notice nearly as much banding. The quality of the photography is astonishing at times and the clarity and color are captivating. I’m sure we’ll see a lot of people use this for demos. The soundtrack is also quite good with a nice score. The narrating can be a bit boring at times, but they typically are.

Extras include a behind the scenes look at how the photographers managed to get their shots plus some deleted scenes.

BBC Earth did a fantastic job with this series and I’m really looking forward to seeing what they do next. The Blu-ray delivers it all with a great A/V presentation making this an easy recommendation!

X