Новая дикая природа (2013) Online

Even I, born & raised in the Netherlands, was extremely surprised by the spectacular views of nature this movie had to offer. Little did I know that my home-country housed wild horses, this many different types of birds and (maybe a little too much) creepy crawlers. During the story we follow all kinds of animals, plants and weather conditions during the four seasons. The viewer experiences the bloom of summer, the food frenzy of fall, the cold winter and the hope spring brings.

The narrators voice sometimes gave the movie a childish feel, but luckily the cinematography made up for this little ,sometimes annoying, touch. Because of the lack of plot (it is a nature film), the imagery is a very important factor. Images this breathtaking have become rare in cinema nowadays. Therefore it was very refreshing to see that these Dutch filmmakers understood the importance of cinematography.

If you are an outdoors person, somebody who loves nature in general or a sucker for sublime cinematography, you should definitely watch this movie. The first movie about Dutch nature ever made!

This is a nature documentary showing the wildlife in a Dutch nature reserve called Oostvaardersplassen. The filmmakers (Ruben Smit and Mark Vekerk) have released their 100-minute documentary as a film the public can see at the theatre.

This is not just any nature reserve. According to The Economist, this is "one of Europe's most remarkable conservation efforts" and "the world's most visible example of Pleistocene rewilding, the idea of reintroducing the megafauna that man wiped out as he spread across the globe". Red deer have been introduced, as have Heck cattle (the most modern equivalent of the aurochs). Most remarkable, perhaps, is the massive herd of over 1,100 Konik ponies (descended from tarpans, Europe's last wild horses).

The stars of the show are absolutely the wild ponies (apparently the largest such herd in Europe), but we are also shown the deer, cattle, foxes, geese, swans, kingfishers, fish, frogs, insects, and so on. We see everything, the whole interconnected ecosystem. The place is bursting with life. It's difficult to take in that this is all happening in the space between Lelystad and Almere, on the edge of greater Amsterdam.

Many of the scenes are astonishing. (The scenes with hundreds of grey geese goslings running from the fox comes to mind. As does the scene of butterflies pelted by massive rain drops.) The fantastic camera work is state of the art, with a steady stream of time lapse and high speed photography. The composition is what really stands out though. The palette here is mostly grey, brown, white, and other muted colours. When real colour pops up (eg the kingfishers), it is brilliant. It was a pleasure to see these techniques applied to birds I see every day.

OK, as for quibbles, there are a few. I have a problem with the subtitle "The Netherlands as you've never seen it before." I was expecting more of an overview of Dutch wildlife in general. This movie focuses on one small, unusual reserve 56 km in size. (Admittedly it is an important reserve.)

I accept that everything shown here is "Dutch" and "wild" -- except for the ponies, deer and cattle. I'm sorry but the ponies and cattle at least are not really Dutch and not really wild. They were introduced; they can't leave. It's just a big zoo. (Although by Dutch standards they are as wild as they can ever get, I suppose.)

The movie (as good as it was) was a little too slow for me. My score is based largely on this fact.

I can be fascinated from beginning to end by nature documentaries, but that didn't happen with this one. If I have to put my finger on why, I would say it was the writing. There were plenty of fascinating facts and evocative scenes, but I would have preferred a connecting story line. We see the birth of a young pony and follow her initial struggles, but then we don't find out what happened to her. We witness the dignified death of a cold and exhausted deer — this moved me to tears — but we don't know her back story. Although there were plenty of engaging scenes that drew me right in, I seem to prefer having a story to follow.

Also, the orchestral music was appropriate and well done, but I would have preferred something else. This kind of music doesn't evoke an emotional response in me.

All in all, a good film well worth seeing.

Like a lot of people in the Netherlands, I was not aware that we had such a great nature reservation like this in our country. The footage shown was very beautiful (near BBC standards) but I was disappointed by the narration. It lacked a good story; at the beginning of the movie it jumped from one species to the next without a nice, spoken transition. It felt like we were left hanging without a proper end to the story. At times the narration seemed aimed at children, sounding really educational (which is good in a way) and at others it seemed almost like they were telling a tale. In conclusion, I'd recommend this movie, but I'd like to hear a different narration next time (for the television broadcast there will be by the way) with better writing. Perhaps they should make an educational version for kids as well. But, don't let the (in my opinion) poor narration hold you back, because this movie deserves to be watched.