Reviewed by Viken Nokhoudian

Narration: Queen Latifah

Written by: Kristin Gore, Linda Woolverton and Mose Richards

Music: Joby Talbot

Principal Photography: Adam Ravetch

Director: Adam Ravetch and Sarah Robertson

"Arctic Tale" is an impressively photographed story of the lives and hardships of creatures in the frozen north.  Primarily following a polar bear cub and a walrus calf from birth to maturity, we are given a close-up glimpse of their lives and their hardships.  I am greatly impressed at the daring photography of Adam Ravetch and his support crew whose images bring us within a whisker's distance of these immense and dangerous animals.  If the narration had adhered to the famed National Geographic documentary style rather than the more recently popularized fabulist, I am confident I would have reached the end credits with a feeling of deep satisfaction.

Before delving into the main feature, I must mention that I was intrigued by the only upcoming movie preview on this disk.  A new children's fantasy film, "The Spiderwick Chronicles", appears to be a more fulfilling exploration of the imaginative potential touched upon in "Bridge to Terabithia". I shall be seeing it.  Significantly, "Spiderwick Chronicles", like "Arctic Tale", is a fantasy film targeting children as its primary audience.  But why would I suggest "Arctic Tale" is a fantasy?  It is composed mainly of factual footage and information.  So, please, read on.

Opening to a wintry scene of blowing snow across a blue-tinted (yes, tinted for effect) field of ice, we are plunged into winter's icy grip.  As Queen Latifah narrates, this is a remote and ancient Kingdom, and she tells us it has always been a paradise on Earth for animals adapted to the cold.  We are warned that these creatures will face challenges 'never before' faced by their species.  This raises the question, has the Earth never warmed more than now in the history of these species' existence?  Well, the small children targeted by this tale will not likely be able to question the assertion.

With the stage set, the film goes on to follow the lives of two adorable new-borns in this world.  Nanu, a polar bear cub, crawls from her wintry den for the first time, along with her mother and her new brother.  Seela, a walrus calf, is born into a watery realm and held in a loving embrace by her mother.  Each in her own element, these two creatures will learn from their parents how to find food and avoid harm in their frigid, highly competitive world.

Soon, though, Nanu's life becomes one of hardship.  Food is difficult to find and her brother dies slowly of starvation.  I found the bears' grief as they lingered by the dying cub deeply touching.  I had to wonder how often this sort of thing happens.  While this is cast as a climate change tragedy, a bit of research indicates that about 40% of polar bear cubs do not live to maturity.  Moving right along...  Years pass and Nanu matures beyond her mother's ability to provide for her. With a menacing glare and snarls, she is driven away to fend for herself.  To provide some clarity to this situation, Kristin Gore might have mentioned that it is normal for a mother polar bear to do this when the cub reaches an average of 2.5 years of age.  Omission of this and other information tends to generate misunderstandings about the causes of such behavior and, again, the suggestion is that climate change has driven the mother bear to do this.  I get the impression that my feelings are being intentionally manipulated.

As Nanu and Seela mature, they must increasingly fend for themselves.  Their worlds collide as polar bears hunt walrus for food.  Without ice sheets to lounge on, the walrus swim for days to reach a remote island, hopefully far from the reach of the bears.  Polar bears also happen to be strong swimmers and arrive at the same island.  Catering to the sensibilities of youthful viewers, shots of polar bears dining on walrus and seal do not include detailed close-ups.

This tale is composed with some truly amazing photography.  Footage of the Narwhale, the unicorn of the sea, is the first I have ever seen.  More impressive moments include a polar bear walking across the ice, with the cameraman underwater shooting upwards through the ice.  Touching, comical moments include adult polar bears playing the 'run and slide' game on a smooth patch of ice.  Close-up shots of bears stalking their prey kept me wondering, "how the heck?"  The cinematographers clearly took some great risks in capturing these scenes and the payoff is terrific.  I was captivated and wanted to see more.

But, as the title says, this is a 'tale', not a documentary.  This is a recently released film and, given the current political climate in environmental film-making, I was concerned that this would be a superficial and politically charged piece of work.  Sadly, I was not disappointed in this expectation.  In order to learn more about polar bears, having my curiosity aroused but not sated by the narrative, I did a bit of research and found useful child-level information at http://www.fuzzyphoto.com/polarbear.html

From Paramount, the studio that brought us "Inconvenient Truth", comes this tale of a polar bear cub and a walrus pup born into 'climate change'.  Paramount also brought "March of the Penguins" to our screen, yet this film seems more closely connected to Al Gore's piece due to his daughter's contributions to the 'tale'.  Kristin Gore, like her father, has crafted a piece of work that somewhat resembles documentary in its use of original footage yet, through language craft and omission, seems to serve an agenda.

For many years, I have enjoyed the blunt factuality of National Geographic documentaries.  They reveal the lives of people and creatures in exotic places, informing and educating us.  The factuality and bluntness of their narration establishes credibility for the material even to the discerning adult viewer.  Yet, this particular release left me feeling propagandized.  As the end-credits rolled, I was bombarded with images of little children telling me that if my mommy and daddy buy a hybrid car, it will be easier for the polar bears to get around, that if I use cheap, renewable energy, I can save the world.  I was saddened to see children used to propagate such messages, even more to think that this might be used as an 'educational' video to shape young minds.  This product lacked sufficient explication for educational purposes.

The musical track by Joby Talbot was overly lyrical for a documentary.  Oh, right, this was a 'tale'.  Like a Disney feature with animal actors, the soundtrack might as well be part of the narrative.  In that perspective, I found the score slightly annoying but definitely a supporting element of the story-telling.  I believe a proper documentary should use music sparingly and then only for mood effects.

In sum, I found this film to be a fascinating watch, moderately informative and sometimes irritatingly narrated.  It seemed a fabulist concoction rather than a documentary.  I am certain that the footage painstakingly collected over fifteen years by Ravetch and crew could be built into a deep exposition of the lives of the creatures of the north.  I hope it is someday.

My rating of this film is:  5 out of 10

SPECIAL FEATURES:

MAKING OF ARCTIC TALE

Narrated by Adam Ravetch, principal cinematographer, we learn of the tremendous effort this project required.  The footage we see is the result of fifteen years worth of photography by a young, ambitious crew, often short on funds, who had no idea they were compiling a feature film.  They wanted to push the limits and collect the most fascinating, never-before seen images of some very difficult-to-photograph wildlife.  They succeeded.  I want to see more of their footage!

The photographers learned to cope with the hazardous environment and challenges of getting close to the animals.  Finding themselves in unfamiliar territory, the crew appealed to the local Inuit for help and got a guide.  He kept them out of harm's way and helped them find some of the more difficult and rare shooting opportunities.  I was impressed to learn that over two years' effort was devoted to finding a newborn walrus calf, something probably never before witnessed or photographed.  Ravetch made ingenious use of equipment and took great personal risks to capture close-up shots of the calf in its mother's care.

As Ravetch explains, Arctic tale was made to celebrate the qualities of the wild Arctic creatures.  With progressively extended summers causing shifts in sea ice and weather, this is a tale of the creatures' adaptability to change.  The big message, according to Ravetch, is that if the bears and walruses and other creatures can adapt, why can't we?