There have been some objections recently to the way in which the BBC filmed part of the Frozen Planet series. What I fail to see is why?
Thirty-two people from an audience of 8million objected to the way a scene was filmed, where a Polar bear mother gives birth to her cub. This scene was filmed in a German zoo, enabling filmmakers to capture a scene that would just not have been possible to get in the wild. Apparently, there was a big issue with this. What probably didn’t help was the media jumping straight on it to try and unpick the BBC. However, the BBC did everything in accordance with their own guidelines and took note of audience research carried out a few years ago where viewers were asked questions specifically around this subject. In a press release from the BBC’s Director General (viewable here) he mentioned that some years ago the BBC asked the specific question to their audience, whether they would prefer on-air mentions, either captions or labels, and the overwhelming response from the public was that they did not want them to do that.
It has always been the case that the BBC’s filming techniques are available, where possible after transmission, particularly on the website. This case was no different.
This clip has always been available on the programme’s page and was up pre-broadcast.
‘This particular sequence would be impossible to film in the wild.’
BBC Spokesperson
“Eight million viewers had been led to believe the scene had been captured by BBC cameramen inside an underground cave in the brutal sub-zero temperatures of the Arctic wilderness.”
Daily Mail. – Read more
This was a quote taken from a report in the Daily Mail. It simply isn’t true. I think it should have read.
“Eight million viewers watched an awesome story about a polar bear and her cub. It couldn’t be been captured by BBC cameramen inside an underground cave in the brutal sub-zero temperatures of the Arctic wilderness. So instead some shots were taken in a German Zoo. The footage looked amazing, so stop your bloody moaning”
(Ok, there is a reason I’m not a journalist!)
Ok, admittedly if you watch a sequence where the filmmaker has made a good effort to hide the fact that a sequence was shot elsewhere then you believe that it was all shot in the same place. I am still unsure what all the fuss was about though. The BBC has been as transparent as they could have been without actually labeling the shots on air as ‘filmed elsewhere’. Is this what people really want? (No, according to research).
The other option would be to not bother including it at all, but then you would cut a very significant part of the story out. After all, filmmaking is story telling.
My view on the whole thing is that where needed, artificial or ‘staged’ sequences should be allowed in factual films, IF.. 1. It aids the flow of the story. 2. There is no other option. 3. Filming techniques are freely available to the public after transmission.
For example, imagine a hypothetical film about someone climbing a mountain, I think it would be fair to accept that some shots, for instance close ups of boots in the snow, could be shot somewhere else at another time, but inserted into the sequence to aid the flow of the story. As long as the subject of the story did reach the top and there was no trickery involved to show that the task of climbing the mountain was in any way different to what happened, then I think using the odd shot out of sequence is fine.
I would even go as far as saying, if this story about climbing a mountain needed an interview of the climber inside their tent, on the ascent, but for whatever reason this couldn’t be captured at the time. I, as a filmmaker, would not have a problem with filming the interview on the decent and stage it by asking questions about the ‘forthcoming’ ascent. Nothing would have changed, the climber still climbed the mountain, they still did everything they said they would in the right order with no fakery, just a little interview that was shot slightly out of order. Would anyone care? Well they might do if the papers got hold of the story and tried to finish me… Here’s a thought, say I shot this film but didn’t tell you about the whole interview thing? Would you be annoyed?
1 Comment
One area missing from your blog is that this programme is part of the BBCs Factual/Science & Nature strand. Even as an experienced film-maker, I was was under the impression that this episode was recorded in the location being described in the narrative ie. the wild.
If this cannot be carried out for reasons of practicality there are many ways in which this could have been described without hindering the flow and enjoyment of the programme.
Since the Frozen Planet series employs an epilogue to describe the filming process adopted within the programme, the BBC and Discovery had every opportunity to describe an equally interesting part of the film-making story. However they chose not too. Thereby opening themselves up to this form of criticism. I believe this was for the purpose of making the series even more breath-taking, when in fact this wasn’t necessary.
I therefore feel that BBC and the Frozen Planet producers could have avoided these complaints, without bringing their or the series’ integrity into question.