Last night the first episode of 'Africa' was shown on BBC1. Africa's wildlife have always fascinated me, and Attenborough is a lifelong hero of mine (even more so since I have discovered more about his incredible career, reading his autobiograhpy 'Life on Air') so I was very excited to see his new series.
It will be absolutely no surprise to anybody who has seen any of Attenborough's series before that the program held me enthralled. I enjoyed this episode particularly because it was almost entirely set in Namibia- often in places I have mentioned in previous posts, such as Etosha, the Namib Desert and Spitzkoppe.
Besides being rather stunning, the camerawork was also innovative, showing newly discovered behaviour- in particular, the cantankerous rhino is revealed, by means of night-time footage of delightful clarity, to posess a playful and sociable character. Meanwhile the gentle desert giraffe is exposed as brutally territorial, and a miniscule wasp and spider battle in extraordinary detail. And of course explaining every act of the performance is Attenborough himself, his voice synonymous with the wildlife documentary genre.
If you missed it, watch it now on iPlayer and don't dare miss the next!
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