Review Puff Wonders of the Reef. (Netflix)

[flyboy08]

Gee, I wonder how you feel about world hunger and homelessness?

 

[CT-Rich]

Holy crap! If you watched MOT and thought it was just this one guy recording all the footage, you are being naive. Beautiful videography doesn’t happen by accident or even with really great equipment. They are telling a story. Some of it may be shot as it happens, some is going to be staged or recreated later. An additional shocker would be that there are only two ways to film “Puff”. Either they had video of a bunch of puffers and different stages or they had a single puffer being tank raised and everyone of his shots were staged. Filming in the ocean is a huge logistical challenge.

They we’re both gorgeously shot movies. Take them for what they are worth. At least they weren’t dynamiting the reef to get their ship through…

 

[arew+4]

Anything that is not destroying the ecosystem, and is bringing the eyes and attention of non divers to the beauty and diversity of the under water world is a good thing. Jacque Cousteau's show made up some stuff, but in the process it pulled a million or people underwater and gave them reason to fight for the oceans. Have we become so jaded that we need to attack and attempt to cancel anything we feel is a misrepresentation. It's entertainment, it's beautiful and engaging, it is not a doctoral thesis.

 

[Jake 10]

@CT-Rich, watched it last night and it was pretty cool.

 

[boulderjohn]

Thanks for bringing the show to my attention--it is very nicely done--however it was done.

 

[Rick Brant]

I enjoyed watching both films, I'm just asking for transparency in how these films were made. MOT won an academy award as a "Documentary". That means that what the film showed should have actually happened. It's clear that the footage was not captured in the way the film implies. If documentary filmmakers simply create ("re-create") scenes however they want to, then they are not documenting anything. I would not have any issue with either of these films if they were considered narrative fiction/drama, which is exactly what they are.

 

[Lorenzoid]

It doesn't matter to me how it was filmed--whether there was only one pufferfish or several lookalikes, or whether it was filmed entirely in the wild or partly in a tank. What I don't like are documentary-like films that anthropomorphize animals. In Puff, they gave the fish a name and turned it into a main character. MOT took that device even further. I have seen some other films that are more like nature docu-dramas, following a pride of lions or whatever as though they were a human family. "It looks like Mary is going to bring home an elk for the family's dinner." I liked Puff better than MOT because at least the main, uh, character was actually the fish. In MOT, the filmmaker made the film more about himself than the octopus, which struck me as arrogant--typical of travel show hosts nowadays, but not so much documentary filmmakers. Nature documentaries should be about the animals, not the host. I don't care about the host's personal revelations--what the octopus "taught" him. The host should be my guide, nothing more. David Attenborough, perhaps the best nature documentary host ever, wouldn't do this silliness.

 

[BlueTrin]

Thanks watches it yesterday, it was very good.

@sassyalice , this is one is not as ‘entertaining’ as the previous recommendation but you may enjoy it more

 

[Scuba_Jenny]

It doesn't matter to me how it was filmed--whether there was only one pufferfish or several lookalikes, or whether it was filmed entirely in the wild or partly in a tank. What I don't like are documentary-like films that anthropomorphize animals. In Puff, they gave the fish a name and turned it into a main character. MOT took that device even further. I have seen some other films that are more like nature docu-dramas, following a pride of lions or whatever as though they were a human family. "It looks like Mary is going to bring home an elk for the family's dinner." I liked Puff better than MOT because at least the main, uh, character was actually the fish. In MOT, the filmmaker made the film more about himself than the octopus, which struck me as arrogant--typical of travel show hosts nowadays, but not so much documentary filmmakers. Nature documentaries should be about the animals, not the host. I don't care about the host's personal revelations--what the octopus "taught" him. The host should be my guide, nothing more. David Attenborough, perhaps the best nature documentary host ever, wouldn't do this silliness.

Of course as the name implies My Octopus Teacher.. the author is sharing what he learned from the octopus... him telling the story was central to the movie.

Puff was cute. I wasn't crazy about the fast zoom ins and outs, maybe that was how they segwayed between macro and wide angle sans actual footage? The story line was Ok, ominous music playing as a sea horse passed was laughable, but overall, it was a nice movie. Loved the colors, and the concern for the reefs. Maybe there is a kid who watched it who now wants to be a scuba diver to save the reefs. Or maybe a diver looks again during their dive and the blinders are off.. they finally see the demise of the coral reefs.

 

[Lorenzoid]

Of course as the name implies My Octopus Teacher.. the author is sharing what he learned from the octopus... him telling the story was central to the movie.

Maybe what bothered me was that I felt the movie blurred the line between documentary and Disney. I like to know whether what I'm watching is fact or fiction. I suppose I enjoy both documentaries and feel-good animal shows, but it adds to my enjoyment to know where the line is. Same with any scenes in Puff that may have been staged in a tank.