ViewGuide

Created Aug 12, 2010 07:46PM PST • Edited Aug 15, 2010 06:42PM PST

1. Quality

2. Summary

   Great 4.0

   Spectacular ocean creatures jump, school, dive, and crash in new and surprisingly intimate ways in this engaging documentary. Just when you thought that decades of Discovery Channel and Jacques Cousteau have delivered every which way to bring our spectacular oceans to the screen, the images and sounds in Oceans prove that they’ve just scratched the surface.

   Baby sea turtles aborning, birds diving like depth charges into writhing schools of silvery sardines, vaulting herds of dolphins: the sea life displayed in this film is simply spectacular.

   Even on the modest screen of an airplane cabin, it seemed both grand and intimate.

4. Acting

   Very Good 3.5

   Pierce Brosnan did a fine job narrating. I’m choosing to not judge the ocean creatures as actors.

5. Male Stars Very Good 3.5

6. Female Stars Very Good 3.5

7. Female Costars Very Good 3.5

8. Male Costars Very Good 3.5

10. Film

    Great 4.0

    Well written and composed, the film’s narrative structure serves as an excellent platform for its spectacular images. The writers are also to be commended for going easy on the environmental doom and gloom, wisely making this more a celebration of the oceans than a premature eulogy.

    Finally, the filmmakers have captured sounds both soft and huge, underwater and above, providing a soundtrack often as amazing as the images.

11. Direction Great 4.0

12. Play Very Good 3.5

13. Music Very Good 3.5

14. Visuals Perfect 5.0
15. Content

16. Edge

    Tame 1.0

17. Sex Innocent 1.0

18. Violence Gentle 1.0

19. Rudeness Polite 1.0

21. Reality

    Natural 1.0

    Documentary.

22. Circumstantial Natural 1.0

23. Biological Natural 1.0

24. Physical Natural 1.0