Customer Reviews

Disney Nature Earth

5 star:		(40)
4 star:		(18)
3 star:		(11)
2 star:		(15)
1 star:		(20)

 

 

I bought this because of the way it was advertised. It was said that they followed 3 families, polar bear, whale and elephant families. I already saw BBC Planet Earth and I have a copy. I knew that it was made from footage taken at the same time that planet earth was filmed by BBC however I thought, because of the hype, that it would have additional footage of those 3 particular animal families that maybe they didn't put in the other films because of time constraints or they didn't want to dwell too much on one thing. I was wrong The footage on Disney's DVD is exactly the same. They show a lot of footage that does not pertain to any of the 3 groups to fill the added time. The photography is good, the views breathaking and worth watching but if you have a copy of the BBC planet earth series, don't buy it; you already have a copy of all the footage on those. There is nothing new here and it does not follow the 3 families in detail as advertised. If you don't have the plant earth dvds and you want a much more shortened version you would enjoy this.

I've read a lot of reviews complaining that this is just Planet Earth repackaged, and it is the same footage...but, can you beat the Planet Earth footage?? Nope! We have the Planet Earth series, but there is no way my kids would sit and watch it. The Disney Earth movie took the best and funniest bits and pieces of Planet Earth, added a more "kid friendly" voice, and packaged it into a 1 1/2 hour film. My 5, 3, and 2 year old ALL sat down to watch this entire movie and laughed and screamed to whole time. They loved it!!! And I loved watching it with them. Ever since, they've been pretending about waterfalls and jungles and safaris and such. Great short version of Planet Earth for the kids!!! Ignore the other complaining reviews!

This nature documentary is a 90-minute mini-version of the much longer Planet Earth produced by the BBC. The latter production took five years to make, had a $25 million budget, and employed the latest in photographic technology. The super slow motion and time lapse techniques are especially impressive. Watching the twelve-month transformation of a forest in 30 seconds is spectacular. Earth focuses on three animal "families"--a polar bear and two cubs, a herd of elephants, and then a mother and baby humpback whale that make a 4,000 mile migration. In between these three stories the film intersperses takes from the longer documentary. My only complaint is that this production oversells the product with music that at times is both melodramatic and cutesy, and a corny narration that is clearly intended for young children ("Time for mom and dad to fix breakfast for junior!"). If there is any nature photography that does not need hype, this big screen version is it. Still, like its longer predecessor, Earth makes for fantastic family viewing.

I wish I would have done more research before purchased "Earth." "Earth" is a basically a condensed, child friendly version of "Planet Earth." It's great if you want to expose your children to the wonders of planet earth, but they lack the patience to sit through the BBC series. I also thought the narration left something to be desired. It did not really add much to the film and felt "dumbed-down." Disney's choice of James Earl Jones was also kind of comical, as I felt that Darth Vader himself was teaching me about the earth. The movie looks great, but we have seen it all before. If the series "Planet Earth" never came out, I could easily give this 4 stars, but "Earth" is just recycled footage with dry narration.

I was looking forward to watching this as I've enjoyed the other films finding their way into the dvd market such as Planet Earth and Blue Planet.

But unfortunately this one really misses the mark. I'd say 3/4 of this film is actually Planet Earth! And I don't mean similar to it, I mean it uses exact footage. Scenes involving the elephants getting attacked by lions at night with the lightning cracking in the background as well a heartbreaking scene involving the polar bear trying to survive with no ice left.

It started off well and good showing great footage with accompanying facts I did not know. But it quickly piles on the Planet Earth footage.

So if you own Planet Earth you may want to rent this first. See if it's for you or not. I'm also skeptical of their next advertised dvd - Oceans. Something tells me it will probably just be Blue Planet.

And yes, this dvd was a joint production between Disney, the BBC and Discovery Channel so I should have known I guess.

But I'm sure there are others out there that would have liked to have known.

If you've seen Planet Earth already, there is no reason at all to watch this. All this movie is is bits and pieces of Planet Earth. It just makes no sense.

Really disappointed. I purchased Earth because I thought it would have unique footage. The whole movie is made from the Planet Earth series. No where on the packaging of the movie did it say this was footage from Planet Earth. Don't buy. Save your money.

We got this because the trailer looked so exciting, but I wish I had read the reviews first. Not only is it kind of uninspiring, but it repeatedly creates suspense over the death of the animals. Look at the family of polar bears, aren't they adorable, oh wait, the Daddy bear is lost at sea, starving to death. Oh no! The baby elephant is dehydrated and near dying, will he make it to the water hole?

It was horrible that we watched it with my 4-year-old. The only part he liked were the amazing footage of the waterfalls where it feels like you're going over. I didn't feel like it told a story about the animal families, it lost focus when it followed other animals, and it was too morbid. I wish I could get my money back.

I couldn't believe I paid for a collection of clips from a documentary I already own, only with a inferior narration. Disney, I want my money back!

Stay home and watch it on Discovery or buy it on DVD/BluRay. I wish I would have come here and read a review or two to get that message first, but I don't think it's unreasonable to expect completely original footage in a new feature film. That said if you haven't seen any of the BBC/Discovery stuff at all, and you don't want to invest the time or money into "Planet Earth" (but you should it's much better), it is pretty enough to be worth the ticket.