My Octopus Teacher, directed by James Reed and Pippa Ehrlich and released by Netflix in September, is not a normal nature documentary. It’s the story of Craig Foster, a somewhat stiff but likable South African gentleman, who falls in love with an octopus. For real. Seeking to escape the drudgery of his adult life and reconnect with nature, he returns to the kelp forest where he swam as a child. Slowly reintroducing himself to the freezing waters of the South Atlantic, Craig swims without a wetsuit to maintain his connection with his surroundings. One day he notices a small common octopus, Octopus vulgaris, doing something amazing. Entranced, he decides to follow it every day, and little by little, earns its trust.
Don’t come here looking to learn everything about octopuses, that’s what the internet is for, watch this film to put yourself in the fins of a human as he develops an incredible relationship with a wild animal. Don’t get me wrong, it’s funny at first, the way he talks about the octopus. I laughed out loud at lines like, “The boundaries between her and I seemed to dissolve. Just the pure magnificence of her” and “Perhaps it does give you some strange level of octopus joy.” But it doesn’t take long before you’re pulled down into the depths with him, caught up in the drama of her daily life as she hunts crabs and hides from Pyjama sharks. Before long you realize, completely and inexorably, that you’re in love with this octopus too.
It’s a refreshing change of pace from more traditional documentaries like Blue Planet or Planet Earth. The very scope of those projects renders them impersonal. We spend a couple minutes with each animal, see some incredible photography swaddled in David Attenborough’s voice-blanket, and then we move on. My Octopus Teacher is zoomed all the way in. It’s the study of one tiny patch of kelp forest. It’s like an interview with one of the Blue Planet camera people. What was it like spending all that time with these animals? What did it feel like the first time a dolphin swam up and booped your nose? Mind-blowing? I bet.
It’s also nice to hear Foster speak openly about the conflict between his roles as observer and participant. He strives to preserve the natural life cycle of the kelp forest, forcing himself to sit by while some gut-wrenching scenes play out. Of course you would want to chase those asshole Pyjama sharks away; it’s all just so relatable.
The “teaching” part of My Octopus Teacher feels a little like an afterthought, like they needed some way to frame the whole thing and going with straight up love story would have put people off. I think the most important lesson the octopus teaches Craig is that he’s part of the world of the kelp forest, not a visitor. That every creature, large or small, plays a vital role in the health of its immediate eco-system. It’s a lesson we could all stand to learn. We treat the earth like rockstars in a cheap hotel. We think we’re gonna empty the minibar, defenestrate the TV, and skip out on the bill, but there’s no where to skip to. This king bed suite is all we’ve got.
If you give My Octopus Teacher a chance, I think you’ll really like it. It doesn’t take a nature freak to recognize what a life-changing experience this must have been, and Foster does an excellent job of sharing it both with his camera and his recollections. It’s a small story, one man rediscovers his connection to nature, but it’s one that needs to be told more often.
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