You know, for all that I have been reviewing a variety of films and television programs whilst a part of this website, I haven't really taken advantage of all the streaming shows that are now available to me. I have occasionally perused Amazon Prime or Crunchyroll, but the variety of services has become almost saturated in recent years, giving me plenty of opportunities for new content to write about. Especially because I also want to start reviewing and recommending more nonfiction and documentary pieces.
I say all this to bring up the fact that Disney+ and Hulu have a wide variety of National Geographic nature documentaries available for viewing. I have absolutely adored nature documentaries and animal programming ever since I was a small child (thank you, Crocodile Hunter) and so when I saw the options for viewing, I was genuinely thrilled. The only question became, what do I review among the wide variety of nature documentaries?
Then I saw it. A six part nature documentary series entitled Inside the Enchanted Forests, focusing on the vast array of forest and woodland biomes throughout the globe. A episodically light documentary with a light and whimsical tone was just the sort of thing to take a deeper look at.
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- Produced by National Geographic
- Available on Disney+ & Hulu
- Number of Episodes: 6
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SUMMARY
Inside the Enchanted Forests is a relaxed 6 episode nature documentary on Disney+ that takes a look at woodlands across the planet, with each episode focusing on a specific subcategory of woodland (Tropical, Seasonal, Wetlands, Mountain, Boreal, and Extreme). Narrated by Fenella Fudge, each episode is a series of vignettes from forest around the globe detailing various trees, insects, and other animals which reside within those woodland biomes and how they interact with one another to promote the welfare of the forest as a whole.
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REVIEW
On the surface, Inside the Enchanted Forests is your bog-standard National Geographic nature documentary. If you watched one of these documentaries, there really isn't going to be anything in this series that should shock or surprise you. And beneath the surface, it is very much of the standard and quality that I have come to expect of National Geographic in the streaming age. That being said, I do, in fact, have quite a bit to say, both positive and negative about this six part documentary series.
The first and biggest positive is generally a matter of tone. This entire series is so incredibly relaxing. The combination of stellar narration work by Fenella Fudge, mixed with soothing music and absolutely stunning visuals leaves Inside the Enchanted Forests the kind of series that I would even leave on in the background, outside of any active watching. In fact, I would recommend turning this documentary on if you are ever in need of soothing relaxation and relaxed passive viewing of television. If you need something in the background, but don't want to actively watch anything.
And I would recommend this because the visuals really are quite stunning. I love how clean the images captured are and their is a pleasant variety of cinematographic shots employed by the director and editors. We have underwater shots, time-lapses of plants and animals, shots of birds in flight, shots of incredibly small insects, night and day shots. Shots of animals in places that are often quite difficult to see normally. The series fully immerses you in its busy and varied locales by fully utilizing its camerawork to give an incredible performance.
Though that does bring me to what I would consider to be my biggest gripe with the series. Not really a criticism, but definitely something that I struggled with while watching. Most nature documentary series will tend to focus on a single region which best exemplifies the subject of that episode; for example, an episode on tropical forests might focus on the Amazon. The episode then might use the perspective of a group of animals living in that region, personifying them with names and attributed personality traits, to weave a story and expose the audience to the world these animals live in "through" their eyes. Inside the Enchanted Forests doesn't do this, and it can be extremely disconcerting.
Instead, the best way I can describe Inside the Enchanted Forests model of presentation is to consider each episode to be a loosely connected selection of 5-6 vignettes from around the globe to give the audience a wide-scale perspective of the topic of each episode as a whole. Rather than focusing on one single tropical rainforest to give us as the audience a perspective on the nature of tropical rainforests as a whole, the series instead goes for giving us a wide and varied view of tropical rainforests all over the globe, to show us more in less detail. Its not exactly a wrong way of presenting the media, but it is definitely less engaging and oftentimes we as an audience move so quickly from one vignette to another that I would sometimes miss the transition and get confused or just find myself never allowed to just immerse myself in that one environment before we are rushing to the next one.
It's rather ironic, for all that this series is relaxing and laid-back, its presentation feels almost frantic and desperate to show us as much as we can. It is a disconcerting contrast and one that I do think is not going to appeal to everyone. Despite this, Inside the Enchanted Forests is a relaxing time and I think as long as you are aware that you ought not get attached to any single animal, it becomes a well-shot romp through the forests of the world that focuses just as much on the beauty of the animal kingdom as it does on the close relationship between animals and plants; not a subject often discussed in nature documentaries.
VISUALS
SOUNDTRACK
PRESENTATION
FINAL SCORE - 8/10
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