NOVA: Incredible Journey of the Butterflies Blu-ray offers solid video and audio in this enjoyable Blu-ray release
Every year, 100 million monarch butterflies set off on an incredible journey across North America. These beautiful creatures fly 2,000 miles to reach their remote destination: a tiny area high in the mountains of Mexico. Yet scientists are still puzzling over how the butterflies achieve this tremendous feat of endurance--and how, year after year, the monarchs navigate with such hair's-breadth precision. NOVA flies along with the monarchs, visiting the spectacular locations they call home, and meeting the dangers they encounter along the way. Shot in stunning detail, The Incredible Journey of the Butterflies reveals the monarch as a scientific marvel locked in an inspiring struggle for survival.
Astronomer Carl Sagan, ever searching for ways to put the comparatively tiny amount of space-time
we occupy in the cosmos into perspective, once said, "We are like butterflies who flutter for a day and
think it is forever." And indeed, if humanity is nothing more than a blip on the cosmic radar,
butterflies don't register at all on the air traffic control console of the universe. I mean, they don't
usually even register on my own personal consciousness unless one flies right past me. If we were to
play word association starting with the word "butterfly," I'd probably say "Ashton Kutcher" or "bad
lower back tattoo," instead of something relating to the actual animal. But we shouldn't
underestimate our four-winged Papilionoidean friends. After all, there's that whole chaos theory
business about a butterfly flapping its wings in Brazil and setting off a tornado in Texas. And
butterflies do some pretty amazing stuff. How badass would it be to attach yourself to a twig, hide
away inside a chrysalis, and then emerge sometime later with wings? Some North American
Monarchs even migrate for thousands of miles in an epic trans-generational journey that takes them
annually from southern Canada to central Mexico.
The journey's first step...
That's the subject of the PBS production The Incredible Journey of the Butterflies, a
Nova-series documentary by director Nick de Pencier. We begin with a single caterpillar, a
yellow, black, and white creature that looks uncannily like one of the striped socks you'd see the
Nanny in The Muppet Babies wearing. This little guy will shed his skin four times—we get
to see this somewhat disgusting process in super-close-up macro cinematography—and then
disappear into a hard-shelled chrysalis, where Mother Nature works her seriously esoteric alchemy.
When the erstwhile caterpillar emerges—once again, we see every icky detail—it has enormous
velvety wings, which it sets to drying in the sun. As if this weren't amazing enough, we learn that
this newly minted Monarch is about to embark on a journey from the Lake Huron region in
Canada, to a 60-square-mile area in the mountains of central Mexico, some two thousand miles
away. Obviously, it has never been there before, but somehow, it knows exactly how to get there,
along with the millions of other Monarchs that flock southward to weather out the winter. These
trip-makers are the centenarians of the butterfly world—they live upwards of six months,
compared to the one to two months of non-migratory Monarchs.
The cycle is bizarre: the first generation makes the two thousand mile flight in two months. When
they get to their destination, the mountainside sanctuaries of the Mariposa Monarca Biosphere
Reserve in Michoacán, they chill out for the winter—covering trees in clumps, like living, breathing
leaves—until they work up the energy to mate and, finally, die. It then takes two to three
generations to make the aerial trek back up to Canada, where the whole process begins again. The
real mystery—scientists are still befuddled, apparently—is how these butterflies know where
they're going. There are several theories—they might follow the angle of the sun, or use the
Earth's magnetic field as an orientation guide—but even if we eventually do parse the riddle of
their epic migration, the journey will be no less amazing. Some scientists have even FedEx'ed
shipments of Canadian-born Monarchs to Washinton D.C. and other easterly locations, tracking
them upon release to see if they can still find their way to Mexico. While these displaced Monarchs
fly south out over the Atlantic for a while, their internal GPS eventually kicks in and they
automatically course correct.
The migration really is an Incredibly Journey, and director Nick de Pencier captures it well,
shooting in numerous locations along the route between Canada and Mexico. Apparently, after
filming for a whole year with a sizeable crew, he set out in an RV—alone, with a high definition
video camera—and drove through all of the states on the journey, picking up bits of footage along
the way. According to an interview on PBS's website, he also took numerous hot air balloon trips,
which allowed him to capture a close approximation of "the speed and the way that butterflies fly."
The focus of the narration—by Grease-alum Stockard Channing—is mostly on the wonder
and spectacle of the migration, but there's also an environmental warning hiding under all the
pretty butterfly wings. The program isn't afraid to tackle the issue of illegal logging, which
threatens the migratory pattern of the monarch, but it doesn't resort to fearmongering or guilt-
tripping, as many nature documentaries are oft to do. One scientist, Lincoln Brower, explains that
Monarchs are not endangered, but the phenomenon of their annual migration certainly is. The
subtle metaphor here is that while losing the incredible journey of the butterflies might not be the
end of the world, or even the end of the Monarch species, it would represent the not-so-incredible
journey on which we're sending our planet.
The Incredible Journey of the Butterflies alights onto Blu-ray, courtesy of PBS, with a
1080i/MPEG-2 encoded transfer that's never as visually astounding as nature documentaries by the
likes of the BBC and the Discovery Channel, but occasionally impresses on its own merits. Shot largely
with high definition digital cameras—with some stock film footage thrown into the mix—the program
has a clean, mostly noiseless look. Clarity sometimes errs toward the soft side, especially during longer
shots, but many of the extreme macro close-ups are incredibly detailed, allowing us to see all of the
minute intricacies of butterfly and caterpillar anatomy, from quivering mandibles to fine hairs. As is the
case with many shot-on-video productions, color reproduction and contrast are somewhat
inconsistent. Most of the time, the image is vivid and deep—with dark blacks and intense monarch
oranges—but there are instances where the picture looks a bit overexposed, making the image look
slightly washed out. Thankfully, despite the outdated MPEG-2 encode, compression-related issues are
kept to a minimum, though you'll notice a few instances of banding in some of the finer color
gradients. Overall, you've seen better-looking nature documentaries, but you've probably also seen far
worse.
I wasn't expecting much from Journey of the Butterflies' lossy Dolby Digital 5.1 surround
track, so I was surprised when I got a more-solid-than-it-needed-to-be mix with plenty of immersive
ambience. No, the audio here won't challenge your home theater set-up, but it complements the
documentary well and sounds much more full and detailed than you'd expect from an average PBS
production. The orchestral score fills out the soundfield nicely, showing depth in rich strings and detail
in crisp flutes, and there's plenty of breadth and separation to the music. Likewise, the rear speakers
are frequently occupied with environmental sounds, from field sounds like chirping birds and buzzing
insects, to fireworks during a Mexican festival. There are even a few cross-channel effects, like a glider
panning through the rears. Throughout, Stockard Channing's narration is well-balanced in the mix and
easy on the ears. English SDH subtitles are available, but they look a little small, especially considering
the median age of PBS's audience.
I'm a sucker for learning about obscure natural phenomena, so I enjoyed my time tagging along on
The Incredible Journey of the Butterflies. The material is perfectly suitable for insect-loving
youngsters—easy to understand, with lots of engaging visuals—but there's enough hard science here
to keep adults interested as well. At only 50 minutes, the program does feel a bit short, however, so
unless you or someone you love is a complete butterfly nut, a rental would be a better bet than a
purchase.
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