Frozen Planet - Winter

24th November 2011

CRY: WOLF

'Lost some of its magic, 'series falling off', which idiot wrote that. I am still recovering from last night. This was exceptional, every viewer thankful for the ethereal moments to convalesce between the rounds of savagery. As ever this review sticks with the chronology from last night.

I had a sense of foreboding over this winter issue. It is not as if the other episodes have shown balmy scenes, but this was always going to be brutal: dark anvil skies, sinister storms and sniping sub-freezing winds. How appropriate then to start with the Eiders with a display so numerical that they would have filled a million padded jackets, but it was the chancers that struck the more poignant note, especially as the BBC did not shirk from their responsibilities in showing those who had failed in their mortal gamble.

The Taiga forest is the largest in the world, fortunately it is also the most inaccessible so this great oxygen cauldron cannot be raped in the way the Amazon has been by unscrupulous loggers and the jungles of Indonesia by destructive palm nut barons. Yet again the big budget time lapse cameras did their work and this crucial wilderness was 'wintered' in seconds.

This however was a steady opening, nothing more, a laudable overture but missing the full ensemble. That all changed when the wolves showed up. For once the later Freeze Frame was gripping and emotive; this was some of the finest wildlife sequences ever filmed. To possess the two angles was extraordinary but shows the perfectionist attitude of the team whatever the conditions. The moment the overhead camera picked up both the hunters and hunted was the moment this episode leant on the accelerator. Down below, a low angle showed the wheezing bison coughing up snow before losing one of their number to the tenacious female. The hour-long harrowing tussle was both intoxicating and visceral in equal measure; again and again the tables were turned before the wolf triumphed (but for how long).

I needed a rest after that; the remarkable symbiosis between the raven and the wolverine provided it. Apparently the wolverine is the most gluttonous animal in the world; they should name a cruise ship after it. Apart from inviting the inevitable infantile orchestra, the tiny weasel was incredible. To have the below-ground cameras positioned to catch a kill was surely sorcery and if that wasn't, then the little critter's interior decorating skills surely were. It was again time for a leisurely interval and the Northern Lights provided it with an almost 60's drugs induced trance-like look at both poles under vivid psychedelic illuminations.

On paper, a marine discussion of soft water brine sinking into the depth then freezing is dull. Put a delay camera on this for a few weeks and you have an icy entombing straight from a big budget science fiction film. It was both shocking and absorbing.

After something so bleak, a little bit of heart-warming drama was welcome and the returning prodigal Emperor girls transferring the chicks between their happy feet was touching. Equally heart-warming were the thousands of reunions, but just before this turned into an anthropomorphic Disney-fest there were the potential surrogates, desperate for immediate ownership after their own bereavements, fiercely chasing any youngster across the ice like labradors chasing deer in Richmond Park

Exhausting, extraordinary, remarkable, I've run out of adjectives, the arsenal is bare. It was good to see the ice-trapped Khlebnikov again though from 2009 that so many Exodus people were on, but but... enough now, I need to lie down.

Related links:

Frozen Planet Reviews - Episodes 1, 2, 3

Frozen Planet - Autumn -4th Episode

Frozen Planet - Winter - 5th Episode

Photography trips with Paul

'Georgia .... on your mind? - Exclusive charter to South Georgia October 2013

Spitsbergen in 3 minutes Version 1

Sptisbergen in 3 minutes version 2

Read the latest blogs from Exodus' Paul Goldstein who led two Spitsbergen charters in summer 2011

Shortlist.com:: Comments on the BBC Wildlife documentary series 'Frozen Planet' and explains you too can visit The Real Frozen Planet (November 2011).