Walking with Beasts

2001

Seasons & Episodes

  • 1
  • 0
8.3| TV-14| en| More Info
Released: 15 November 2001 Ended
Producted By: BBC
Country: United Kingdom
Budget: 0
Revenue: 0
Official Website: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00tbkjh
Info

Walking With Prehistoric Beasts explores how life on earth first began. Using real footage, the series goes inside the body of our monster ancestors. For the first time, morphing technology is used to reveal how our ancestors evolved.

Watch Online

Walking with Beasts (2001) is currently not available on any services.

Director

Jasper James, Nigel Paterson

Production Companies

BBC

AD
AD

Watch Free for 30 Days

All Prime Video Movies and TV Shows. Cancel anytime.
Watch Now
Walking with Beasts Videos and Images
View All

Walking with Beasts Audience Reviews

Noutions Good movie, but best of all time? Hardly . . .
Kailansorac Clever, believable, and super fun to watch. It totally has replay value.
BeSummers Funny, strange, confrontational and subversive, this is one of the most interesting experiences you'll have at the cinema this year.
Senteur As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.
TheLittleSongbird Have always been fascinated by dinosaurs, whether reading about them or seeing documentaries and films on them. Love documentaries, especially those of the national treasure that is David Attenborough, and admire Kenneth Branagh a good deal. So my expectations for 'Walking with Beasts' were quite big and that's an understatement.Expectations that were actually mostly lived up to, a good thing for me having seen my fair share of wastes of potential recently. 'Walking with Beasts' is not one of the best documentaries personally seen (far from it), and there are better ones on the subject of dinosaurs. It is also not as ground-breaking as 'Walking with Dinosaurs', as far as dinosaur documentaries go, still a big achievement to this day. Standing on its own without comparing it to anything, 'Walking with Beasts' was very interesting and mostly very well done.'Walking with Beasts' isn't perfect. Sometimes the dinosaur effects are on the stiff side in movement.Did actually appreciate the storytelling approach 'Walking with Beasts' took and it made it entertaining and emotionally investable. It did get in the way though too much of the documentary aspect, which interested and compelled throughout but there could have been more focus on the evidence and such to stop things from being too speculative.However, when it comes to how it's written, 'Walking with Beasts' does just as good a job entertaining and teaching, it's all very sincerely done and it never feels like a sermon. There are things here that are common sense and knowledge but one is taught a huge deal as well.Kenneth Branagh's narration delivery is similarly spot-on, very sensitively delivered and very dignified, his expertise in Shakespeare helps the delivery. The narration is comprehensive and sincere, with a good balance of things known to me and things new to me (really like it when documentaries do that), as well as compelling.Visually, 'Walking with Beasts' may lack the awe-inspiring, almost cinematic quality one anticipates. With that being said, it is beautifully shot, shot in a fluid and non-static way. The sceneries and landscapes are handsomely rendered and mostly the dinosaur effects are impressive.Every episode is appropriately scored, never intrusive or too low-key. There is fun, tension and pathos throughout and the dinosaurs, prey and predator, are like characters that one cares for in the same way they do a human. The documentary aspect of the series is grounded and well researched.Overall, very good though could have been great. 8/10 Bethany Cox
tankace Walking with Prehistoric Beast is sometimes overlooked by its most famous predecessor, but that is a great mistake. To start the stories here are more complex from the Walking with Dinosaurs and that is reasonable, if you think that mammals have more evolved brains. Anyway the location we see here is a bit creepy because many of the places that the events of the series take place are either for the most part the same or they have changed dramatically in geologically speaking (less than 65 million years ago).Also some the majority of the extinct creatures that are presented still have descenders in the modern-day and I remember felling amazed by that fact. A bonus fact is that the graphic due to the improvement of the technology from 1999 are extreme realistic and in all honest look better than Walking with Dinosaurs. In summary it is a sequel ( OK of documentary in this case) done right, so go watch it all six episodes, it is about 3 hours and after you will want to see them again.
Roy Webber I think WALKING WITH PREHISTORIC BEASTS is well-conceived on the whole, though some of the dramatic elements are a bit too contrived to be totally effective ( however, there are a few surprises now and then ). The biggest problem here is a feeling of "deja vu", simply because the structure mirrors the WALKING WITH DINOSAURS series, and the altogether too self-conscience gags; there is one instance per episode where the camera is played to by some action ( mud, broken lens etc. ), and the slow-motion / freeze-frame shots are hokey as well. While the fur / feather textures and animal reconstructions in CGI are quite well done, the faces of the saber-toothed cats in particular look something less than realistic. All in all, the BBC series is a worthy follow-up to DINOSAURS but slightly less. I would rate it a middle "A", compared to an "A+" for the preceding program.
Jonah Falcon Tim Haines made a real misstep in this sequel to Walking With Dinosaurs, in that he made the doc too much of a story, and not enough of a documentary. The smilodon segment, especially, seemed contrived, with the two "brothers" and a lone warrior smilodon named "Half-Tooth." They also take too many great pains to have the animals reacting to the camera. On the other hand, the evolution of man is nicely done - and I strong recommend the Discovery Channel documentary Neanderthal as a companion piece.Speaking of Discovery, once again they make a hash of the documentary, editing out the rougher scenes, and intercutting the Making Of... into it as well. Stockard Channing sounds robotic as the narrator as well. I strongly suggest getting the DVD, which retains all the BBC UK stuff intact.