Our Wilderness

Our Forests, Our Peatlands, Our Seas - there is hardly a region or habitat left that is not covered with its own documentary. Often these films are fascinating to watch, but now offer little that is truly new. Filmmakers Jacques Perrin and Jacques Cluzaud, who with films like Our Oceans and Nomads of the Air can certainly be called pioneers of contemporary nature documentaries, try with Our Wilderness to give the genre, which has been somewhat overused in recent years, a few new impulses, but they don't really succeed convincingly.

In their latest work, the two filmmakers take their audience on a journey through the centuries in our wilderness. They try to show how nature has changed due to the ever-growing influence by humans and how in large parts the habitat for many animals has been destroyed. For this, the fascinating landscape and animal shots are repeatedly interrupted by small game scenes, which not only seem extremely posed, but also work off the usual clichés in an almost embarrassing way: the bad man kills animals and builds roads that destroy their habitat, but the curious children with their big eyes are still good and are therefore our hope for the future. The two filmmakers could not have found an even bigger sledgehammer with which to pound their message on the viewer.

In addition, the film suggests that the nature shown at the beginning no longer exists and that all that is left now are the barren forests seen at the end. That's bullshit in that even the scenes that are supposed to show the past were shot in forests and valleys that exist today. Of course nature has changed. Of course man has destroyed far too much of what makes our planet so unique and beautiful. But to try to convey that in such a striking way is almost infuriating.

It would have been quite enough to let the pictures speak for themselves. The discrepancy between the regions where nature is still almost untouched and the stretches of land destroyed by industry and man's building frenzy is large and frightening enough that it could have perfectly conveyed the film's message. Thus, the film reveals that it doesn't really have much to offer besides great shots. And as well-done as these may be, you don't really feel like you're seeing anything groundbreakingly new here. Therefore, if you're expecting a gripping nature documentary, you'll be annoyed by the pathos of the production in the long run. On the other hand, those who generally like to revel in fascinating shots of the beauty of our nature will certainly get their money's worth here. And that's why I give it an overall "worth seeing" rating: Worth seeing with some reservations

An article by Frankfurt-Tipp