Dolphin Reef Review

Disney fans i've reviewed alot of different films over the years each one with a different genre but there's one genre I haven't tackled yet and that's the nature documentary. Well I thought that I should challenge myself by reviewing a nature documentary and as luck would have it Disney+ released two of them n Friday April 3rd and so here is my review of the Disneynature film "Dolphin Reef" enjoy nature lovers.

As the title would suggest the film follows a dolphin called Echo as he learns to get food himself but it also follows several other creatures most of whom live on or near a reef as they live there lives day to day. I admit the basic story of this film is really sweet and it's nice seeing the creatures interact with each other and without any dialog from the creatures the film get's across it's story rather well I thought.

As you can see by the poster for the film the narrator for the film is actress Natalie Portman who I don't really need to say what she's been in since her work is really well known. Of course she isn't the star of the film that is easily the animals that are featured as it rightfully should be however Portman does do a good job of getting across the story and what each of the animals are like which is something that I found rather interesting.

That being said Sir David Attenborough she is not for while he is full of warmth and charm she really isn't. She seems more focused on giving the animals some character then she is in making us engaged with them and there stories which isn't what a good nature documentary narrator should do they should enhance what's already being shown and explain to the audience what's going on in a way that's easy for them to understand.

Not only is the first nature documentary that i've reviewed it's also the first Disneynature film that i've seen. As such I really had no idea what to expect from them and I was very pleasantly surprised when I saw that all of the locations looked stunning and that the story was very easy to follow it honestly makes me wonder if all of their films are like that or if it's just this one film which is like that.

Just because the film is about animals doesn't mean there aren't a few moments which I guess quite hard to watch. Which was something that I honestly expecting to see a nature documentary but at the same time it wouldn't be a nature documentary if they didn't stay true to what really happens in nature even tho the scenes can at times be a I guess a bit hard to watch especially if you love or even like water animals.

As is to be expected from a nature documentary the film is filled with alot of stunning shots and when I say alot I really do mean it. I have no idea how long it took them to get these shots are where they even filmed this movie but bravo to the team behind it because there are a lot of shots in this movie which took my breath away and that is something that I very rarely get the chance to say but it's something that's true for this film and i'm guessing many other Disneynature films.

The film is only an hour and sixteen minuets long but it really does feel a lot longer then that at least I think it does anyways. Alot of the reasoning behind that is because Natalie Portman isn't really that interesting to listen to since like I said she's more focused on giving the animals some kind of character instead of making the film easy to sit through which in my opinion really does hurt the film.

Anyone who's seen any kind of nature show will know that they usually take years to film to put that into prospective the average TV drama will usually take up to two weeks to film a single episode but any episode of a nature show will take alot longer then that. So I have to wonder how long did it take the makers of this film to film this movie since like most nature shows there following multiple animals but in my opinion however long it was it was worth it for what we ended up with.

For some reason they chose to give the animals comedic voices during the film which to me goes against the whole nature aspect of the film. Since we want to see the characters speaking as they normally would and not here them trying to be funny it just doesn't work and for me was something that was really distracting and I wish that the film makers hadn't included them since it takes away from the film and the story there trying to tell in my opinion.

Overall if this film was without the oddly placed comedic voices it would have been much better in my opinion but it is still a very entertaining film. If this review does go down well then i'll take on the other documentary that Disney released on the same day "Elephant" but this review would have to really well for me to even consider it as for this film tho it gets a 7 out of 10 from this Disney fan and based of this film I might be tempted to looking in Disneynatures back catalogue as well.