The Trials of Life
| The Trials of Life | |
|---|---|
Region 2 DVD cover
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| Genre | Nature documentary |
| Presented by | David Attenborough |
| Composer(s) | George Fenton |
| Country of origin | United Kingdom |
| Original language(s) | English |
| No. of episodes | 12 |
| Production | |
| Executive producer(s) | Peter Jones |
| Running time | 50 minutes |
| Production company(s) |
BBC Natural History Unit Turner Broadcasting ABC |
| Release | |
| Original network | BBC One |
| Picture format | 4:3 (PAL) |
| Audio format | Stereophonic |
| Original release | 3 October – 19 December 1990 |
| Chronology | |
| Preceded by | The Living Planet |
| Followed by | Life in the Freezer |
| External links | |
| Website | |
The Trials of Life: A Natural History of Behaviour is a BBC nature documentary series written and presented by David Attenborough, first transmitted in the United Kingdom from 3 October 1990.
A study in animal behaviour, it was the third in a trilogy of major series (beginning with Life on Earth) that took a broad overview of nature, rather than the more specialised surveys of Attenborough's later productions. Each of the twelve 50-minute episodes features a different aspect of the journey through life, from birth to adulthood and continuation of the species through reproduction.
The series was produced in conjunction with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and Turner Broadcasting System Inc. The executive producer was Peter Jones and the music was composed by George Fenton.
Part of David Attenborough's 'Life' series, it was preceded by The Living Planet (1984) and followed by Life in the Freezer (1993).
The series took over three-and-a-half years to film, during which time Attenborough travelled almost a quarter of a million miles. The production team sought to further push the boundaries of natural history film-making, following on from the advances made in The Living Planet, and were provided with several new challenges.
The sequence of chimpanzees hunting colobus monkeys was only possible through the efforts of Hedwige and Christophe Boesch, who had spent five years studying the apes in the Ivory Coast forests of West Africa.
Meanwhile, a bivouac of army ants in Panama was able to be filmed internally with the aid of a medical endoscope. Furthermore, a new type of camera lens enabled tree ants to be filmed in enlarged close-up just in front of Attenborough — with both subjects in sharp focus. This gave the illusion that the insects were much larger than their actual size.
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