"Wälder unserer Erde" or "Forests of Our Earth" is a German documentary movie written and directed by Heiko De Groot from Hamburg. He has worked on nature documentaries for quite a while already, way over a decade according to his body of work here on imdb, so he is certainly experienced enough for this project. The outcome of these 90 minutes was good enough for sure for me to give it a positive recommendation. I must say I am actually surprised that, looking at the number of votes here, almost nobody has seen it so far since its release back in 2018. Give it a chance when it is on the next time. I have a feeling it is going to be shown here and there on German television just like it was the day before yesterday. The title is really self-explanatory: This is about all kinds of forests on the planet, be it the ones really near like outside of Berlin or those far far away on other continents even, which probably made it also a really challenging project to make with how many different locations they had to travel to. I must say that what I liked the most here were the nature recordings. There are some truly beautiful shots in here and I could give you many examples for that. Most of these of course involve animals because these are the ones that are most difficult to make in terms of coming up with something that stands out, but they managed for sure. Still it is also the simpler ones like the really beautiful sky at times where this film delivers. I also felt they managed a good balance between scenes about animals and scenes about plants, which honestly this film is of course most about, which should not come as a surprise to anybody though given the title. And then again it is very true what the narrator says at the very start with how both are essential for each other in so many cases.
You will also learn a bit while watching this one, unless you are a total expert on the subject. And they are taking it way beyond just telling us about specific tree species, which quickly would have become relatively boring. You can learn for yourself when watching this film, so I will just mention one quick example, namely how animals get bigger and stronger the more closer we get to the ice, but also in contrast how trees and plants get smaller the closer we get to these territories. Moose would be one example for the animals. Still with all the positive being said, there is also one aspect about this film I really did not like at all. And that was the animation. It looked ridiculously bad and cheap honestly, especially compared to these spectacular video recordings shown right before and after that. No clue why De Groot wanted these to be a part of this film. I mean the scenes with the ladybird. And I love ladybirds, but still it was impossible to appreciate these. The difference in quality was just so massive honestly compared to everything else you see during these 1.5 hours. No idea what they were thinking, it was really cringeworthily bad and on a level where I could definitely call it a negative deal-breaker. Such a shame. And as these inclusions happen fairly frequently, especially in the first half, it is a real problem. Perhaps they thought this would make it easier for the film to be seen by younger audiences, maybe even school classes, but it just entirely backfired in my opinion. So yeah, this was really the only struggle I had with this film. Otherwise perhaps I'd even have given it a 4 out of 5 rating because apart from that they did really fine overall, also with the narration. The voice worked well and they did a good job in turning this into an informative film that still did not go too much into detail and definitely did not turn out to be too complicated or scientific. So all in all, it is a thumbs-up and positive recommendation for me. I suggest you check it out the next time it is on, unless you dislike (nature) documentaries. I think it is worth seeing. Or maybe record it and fast-forward when the animated sequences are on. They also felt so artificial compared to the nature sequences, so it was a big contrast from this perspective too that it is really all about (the "natural" side) and not in a positive way at all. Pity.
You will also learn a bit while watching this one, unless you are a total expert on the subject. And they are taking it way beyond just telling us about specific tree species, which quickly would have become relatively boring. You can learn for yourself when watching this film, so I will just mention one quick example, namely how animals get bigger and stronger the more closer we get to the ice, but also in contrast how trees and plants get smaller the closer we get to these territories. Moose would be one example for the animals. Still with all the positive being said, there is also one aspect about this film I really did not like at all. And that was the animation. It looked ridiculously bad and cheap honestly, especially compared to these spectacular video recordings shown right before and after that. No clue why De Groot wanted these to be a part of this film. I mean the scenes with the ladybird. And I love ladybirds, but still it was impossible to appreciate these. The difference in quality was just so massive honestly compared to everything else you see during these 1.5 hours. No idea what they were thinking, it was really cringeworthily bad and on a level where I could definitely call it a negative deal-breaker. Such a shame. And as these inclusions happen fairly frequently, especially in the first half, it is a real problem. Perhaps they thought this would make it easier for the film to be seen by younger audiences, maybe even school classes, but it just entirely backfired in my opinion. So yeah, this was really the only struggle I had with this film. Otherwise perhaps I'd even have given it a 4 out of 5 rating because apart from that they did really fine overall, also with the narration. The voice worked well and they did a good job in turning this into an informative film that still did not go too much into detail and definitely did not turn out to be too complicated or scientific. So all in all, it is a thumbs-up and positive recommendation for me. I suggest you check it out the next time it is on, unless you dislike (nature) documentaries. I think it is worth seeing. Or maybe record it and fast-forward when the animated sequences are on. They also felt so artificial compared to the nature sequences, so it was a big contrast from this perspective too that it is really all about (the "natural" side) and not in a positive way at all. Pity.
