An up-close picture of a terrific white shark from the movie “Nice White Open Ocean” on Shark Week. Shark Leisure, Inc.
A breaching nice white shark off the coast of South Africa from “Air Jaws: High Weapons” on Discovery Channel. Shark Leisure, Inc.
I’ve been watching Discovery Channel’s Shark Week in earnest because the late Nineteen Nineties.
Some opening nights have been memorable, some forgettable and at the very least one has been regrettable. (That will be the “Megalodon: The Monster Shark Lives” fiasco of 2013.)
Due to some spectacular footage and dramatic storylines, this 12 months’s kickoff to the Tremendous Bowl of nature documentary occasions was one of many extra memorable in 34 years. And one veteran filmmaker, who has produced practically 70 specials for Shark Week, guarantees that one thing unprecedented is coming.
“It’s in contrast to something you’ve ever seen on Shark Week,” mentioned filmmaker Jeff Kurr, who has 4 specials on this 12 months’s Shark Week schedule.
Jeff Kurr and ‘Air Jaws’
Kurr helped ship one of many extra groundbreaking moments in shark documentary historical past in 2001. That’s when he and wildlife photographer Chris Fallows gave us “Air Jaws: Sharks of South Africa.”
The particular featured never-before-seen footage of nice white sharks leaping totally out of the water (known as “breaching”) whereas concentrating on seal decoys. I keep in mind Discovery giving a sneak peak of “Air Jaws” throughout Shark Week in 2000. (This was earlier than the times of social media teaser movies.) The pictures caught with me for the whole 12 months, and I made positive my VCR was able to hit report when “Air Jaws” premiered. (This was when DVR, aka TiVo, was a luxurious most school children couldn’t afford.)
On Monday, the 14th installment within the “Air Jaws” franchise premiered on Shark Week, “Air Jaws: High Weapons.” For greater than 20 years, Kurr and his groups have been looking for out new behaviors and using new expertise — all to search out new angles to showcase the good white shark.
However after I chatted with Kurr by cellphone this week, I scrapped most of my questions on “Air Jaws.” I had simply completed my second viewing of Kurr’s “Nice White Open Ocean,” which was a part of Sunday’s kickoff. And I used to be nonetheless attempting to wrap my thoughts round what I’d seen.
A harmful encounter with a terrific white shark
“Nice White Open Ocean” options a few of the extra thrilling and scary shark encounter footage I’ve seen since a bull shark bit into Erich Ritter’s leg throughout “Anatomy of a Shark Chew” in 2003. (Video from one other particular that aired on opening night time, the place a “Jackass” forged member named Sean McInerney was severely injured after being bitten on the hand by a reef shark, additionally makes the listing.)
Kurr’s movie begins with shark professional Jimi Partington taking to the open ocean in a transparent, polycarbonate field. What was “fairly monotonous,” within the phrases of witness Brandon McMillan, for about 45 minutes shortly became a terror-filled encounter.
Partington loses observe of the shark for a second. It bumps the field earlier than circling round and approaching from beneath. That’s when the huge fish shatters the cage with its jaws open, and Partington is ready to narrowly keep away from bodily harm and swim to the boat.
“Actually miraculous how he was capable of keep away from the shark’s jaws,” mentioned Kurr, who was watching from the boat. “I don’t suppose he noticed that shark coming.”
Kurr says the shark was seemingly attempting to “displace” Partington quite than assault him. Massive sharks usually bump kayakers and paddle boarders, and “a lot of the occasions you don’t even hear about it.”
“It was only a nice white being a terrific white,” Kurr mentioned.
Kurr calls the ocean a “concealing surroundings” that requires researchers and filmmakers to get near the animals in an effort to perceive and doc their conduct.
“You want to be inside a few ft, which is inherently dangerous. However that’s what we do for a dwelling,” he mentioned. “These sharks should not malevolent creatures. They’re doing their factor within the ocean, and we select to get near them.”
Orcas vs. nice white sharks
Kurr’s subsequent Shark Week movie debuts Thursday, July 28, and options what he calls an “unbelievable pure historical past occasion.”
Researchers have sufficient proof to know that nice white sharks have their very own pure predators — killer whales. Nonetheless, video proof has been virtually totally absent.
Kurr says his new particular “Shark Home” will function clear video proof, taken by drone, of orcas killing a 10-foot nice white shark.
“It has a few of the most unbelievable pure historical past footage we’ve ever taken,” he mentioned. “You received’t consider it while you see it.”
Jimi Partington’s restoration
It’s been fairly per week for Kurr. The suggestions he’s gotten to date concerning “Nice White Open Ocean” is in contrast to something he’s ever skilled, he mentioned.
The movie is about rather more than Partington’s encounter with the good white within the open ocean. After rising with no scratch, Partington goes again to England because the world enters lockdown because of the COVID-19 pandemic. That’s when he begins experiencing signs of PTSD.
Partington lastly will get the possibility to journey to New Zealand to return nose to nose with nice whites once more. He finds himself in a cage surrounded by nice whites on the ocean ground, adopted by a “snout touching” encounter from the facet of a ship.
The emotional, triumphant second is shortly adopted by tragedy, nonetheless. Shortly after boarding a ship with Kurr and McMillan, Partington suffers a stroke and must be airlifted to a hospital.
The movie concludes by documenting Partington’s wrestle to beat the consequences of the stroke. Kurr, who retains involved with Partington, says his ardour for sharks is “driving his rehab.”
“He loves the movie,” Kurr mentioned. “It was an enormous morale increase to him and his whole household.”
A breaching nice white shark off the coast of South Africa from “Air Jaws: High Weapons” on Discovery Channel.
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