Tag: Documentary

Disneynature’s upcoming documentary Polar Bear is the latest installment in the film studio’s collection after 2020’s Elephant. Helmed by directors Alastair Fothergill and Jeff Wilson, the directing team behind Disneynature’s 2019’s Penguins, the documentary tells the story of a particular polar bear over a 15-year time period.

Given the immense time period and the unforgiving Arctic environment in which Polar Bear was filmed, making the documentary unsurprisingly came with extreme challenges. In an exclusive interview with Murphy’s Multiverse, director Jeff Wilson described some of these challenges, including why a 15-year time period was necessary:

We also wanted to tell this amazingly important environmental story. And to tell that over a three-year period would be dishonest and impossible. But to tell it over a fifteen-year period was absolutely the right time scale in order to kind of capture the change that would happen within a bear’s life.

Jeff Wilson

Polar Bear also specifically follows one bear, making the process that much more arduous. Wilson went on to explain why they needed a female bear to film:

[B]ear behavior is all learned from a mother bear. And so it was crucial for us to tell a story from a mother’s perspective and the story about the mother bear, because that’s where all the interesting behavior happened. That’s where the cubs learn from their mother. So we knew that we had to have a female bear.

Jeff Wilson

But finding the bear for Polar Bear—and filming in general—came with enormous environmental difficulties as well. WIlson continued:

[We] have to spend as much time in that there’s presence as we can possibly stand. And bear in mind that we’re working at the temperatures down to minus 45 degrees. And there’s only so long that you can actually, you know, physically survive in that environment before you have to go back and get a hot meal and have some sleep. And so on any given day, you will have to start from scratch and try and find that bear again and go out and try and find that mother and her cubs again. So it’s a very, very difficult process.

Jeff Wilson

The work put into to the documentary will pay off when audiences get to enjoy the film soon. Disneynature’s Polar Bear launches exclusively on Disney+ on Earth Day—April 22, 2022.

Disneynature has created quite the collection of wildlife documentaries over the years. The next installment, Polar Bear, tells the story of a new mother whose memories of her own youth prepare her to navigate motherhood in the increasingly challenging world that polar bears face today.

Polar Bear is narrated by two-time Academy Award nominee Catherine Keener and helmed by Alastair Fothergill and Jeff Wilson, the directing team also behind Disneynature’s Penguins. The documentary is full of moments in the polar bear’s life that will surely make viewers experience a wide range of emotions. In an exclusive interview with Murphy’s Multiverse, directors Fothergill and Wilson revealed some of the moments that impacted them the most. Fothergill recounted a moment when a polar bear was filmed doing an “aquatic stalk”:

For me, the moment when the female was hunting the seal—they’re doing their what’s called an aquatic stalk—which actually, interestingly, has become more and more common with climate change. But that moment when she was so so carefully and quietly, trying to push herself out of the water, so she could grab the hooded seal. We were there and the cameraman and I, literally, were holding our breath. And we held our breath for a long time because it’s a very long shot in the film. And then she goes back down so quietly and sneaks under the ice flow and tries to grab the shield that fails. That, for me was an amazing moment. Never been filmed like that before.

Alastair Fothergill

Both directors note moments that they experienced which had never been caught on film before. While Fothergill described a hunting moment affected by climate change, Wilson recalls a particularly joyful moment:

[For me,] the serendipity of finding a sperm whale carcass washed up with 20 Bears feeding off of it. It’s something that completely was beyond my wildest dreams. And so to be there and to witness that…And a well fed bear is a happy bear and a happy bear as a playful bear. And there are some very, very unique and special and never been seen before kind of behaviors that are happening around that where you just have 20 bears who come together and play together and almost like a pool party, or barbecue, you know, that just that is so special and so unique that you know, that’s going to be forever seared into my memory as as an experience.

Jeff Wilson

Viewers can experience these moments and more for themselves when Disneynature’s Polar Bear launches exclusively on Disney+ on April 22, 2022—Earth Day.

Disneynature’s latest documentary, Polar Bear, tells the story of a new mother whose memories of her own youth prepare her to navigate motherhood in the increasingly challenging world that polar bears face today. While the film has many uplifting and joyous moments, it takes place against the background of climate change in the Arctic that is threatening the survival of polar bears.

Still, Polar Bear ends on a noticeably optimistic note, with the mother bear (in the form of the voice of two-time Academy Award nominee Catherine Keener) expresses that she and her cub will persevere and survive the changing and dangerous environment. In an exclusive interview with Murphy’s Multiverse, directors Jeff Wilson and Alastair Fothergill were asked why they chose to end Polar Bear in that way. Wilson stated:

I think it’s important for our audiences to have a sense of empowerment and hope at the end of the film, because we believe that that’s the greatest emotion that will drive people to take action. And that really helps us get our message across.

Jeff Wilson

Wilson went on to describe one particular moment in the film that embodies that spirit of hope and resilience:

[The] extraordinary images of the mother bear climbing the iceberg…it’s so impossibly beautiful that you’d never imagine that would happen. But when you film something like that—and you realize at that moment in time when you’re filming it—the power of those images, and the power of the metaphor of what is happening there, you do suddenly the chemistry of script and narration and music and and just the serendipity of capturing that unique moment. [It] gives you the power to take hope, and plant it firmly in the audience’s lap and say, hey, look, this, there is hope here. But you know, there’s also uncertainty.

Jeff Wilson

Viewers can enjoy the documentary’s story and powerful moments when it releases on Earth Day. Disneynature’s Polar Bear launches exclusively on Disney+ on April 22, 2022.