Smashbomb

Search

Search results

All (59)

Content

Johnny Kingdom: A Wild Life on Exmoor

Johnny Kingdom

(0 Ratings) Rate It

Book

Johnny Kingdom is the English countryside made flesh. He has lived his whole life on Exmoor, from...

7 Years of Camera Shake

David Plummer

(0 Ratings) Rate It

Book

As humans, we are drawn to predators like no other group of animals. They are the epitome of form...

Awix (3310 KP) rated The Hellstrom Chronicle (1971) in Movies

May 25, 2020

Playful, technically impressive and possibly very influential wildlife documentary. Scientist Nils Hellstrom, PhD (Doctor of Philosophy), MS (Master of Science), and WF (Wholly Fictitious), expresses his fears for the future of the human race, believing we are likely to be outcompeted by insects in every respect. Startling and occasionally grisly clips showing the lives of insects and other arthropods illustrate his thesis in great detail.

Well, Hellstrom (or more accurately writer David Seltzer, who went on to script The Omen twice) isn't a great biologist (he refers to insects as a species rather than a class), but the photography in the film is great and Lawrence Pressman's well-judged performance adds a lot to the impression the film makes: it's tongue in cheek, but still thought-provoking. As a gimmick to make people watch a wildlife documentary, it's an interesting one; you can sense echoes of this film's innovative use of music and narrative to add drama in many much more respectable nature documentaries (most of David Attenborough's blockbuster series, for instance). An oddity, but a good one.