Science is Fiction: 23 Films by Jean Painlevé

Long before David Attenborough started creating amazing nature documentaries, other visionary pioneering filmmakers set the cerebral stage, some not as fascinated by the more famous untamed beasties, like Jean Painlevé and Geneviève Hamon, who explored unheralded marine life for years.

They set their sights on the limitless sea and created a series of awe-inspiring films, creatively conjured and imaginatively nuanced in this chill and humorous compilation.

Instinctively driven by the unknown creatures whose otherworldly existence salutes biodiversity, they follow the lives of some of the most unique wild animals I've ever seen.

With instructive goals in mind and a desire to encourage aquatic acclimatization, to make one think of the billions of lives which exist beneath the waves while gazing outwards.

Indeed, parts of the ocean are rather similar to the sprawling concrete labyrinths we've come to know as cities, their complex interactive interconnected citizens having steadily evolved for resonant ages. 

I don't know what the turnover rate is for squirrel families on land in local forests, but the coolest thought is that the same squirrel fams have scamperingly existed in the same local woodland for thousands of generations (especially in areas with little to no human contact). 

That's why threats to endangered species acts are so shockingly foolish and cruel, the ways in which they ignore the millions of years these creatures have matured and developed alongside us.

They deserve to be left some space to roam as they freely have since they took formal shape, who are we to mess with the existence of outstanding miracles and flourishing distinction?

Painlevé and Hamon capture such life in its multivariable enriching abundance, and like poets unconcerned with fads they tenderly present the enticing unexpected.

I find with the plethora of contemporary nature documentaries illustriously abounding with fluent synergies, many of them don't lose sight of this focus and still present newfound insects etc.

Thus, in a program at times fiercely focused on lions and cheetahs, there's a pause in the imposing narrative to examine a bug or a bird or a rodent.

Like science-fiction and fantasy nature documentaries have changed remarkably since I was a wee lad.

With thanks to filmmakers like Painlevé and Hamon.

Who thought no doubt this is cool?

Ban octopus farms! 

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