Reviewed by Sam Unsted
Presented by Andrew Marr
UK certification E | UK RRP £29.99 | Runtime 285 minutes | Directed by Cassian Harrison
When you've grown up on a variety of BBC documentary series, mostly wildlife and mostly hosted by Sir David Attenborough, it becomes very difficult for ambitious new series to follow in their wake.
The problem that holds Britain From Above being as mind-meltingly brilliant as Blue Planet for example, is unfortunately a split between these expectations and indeed, our host. The subject matter is fascinating: an experiement in trying understand the UK by looking at it from above to attempt to gain a new perspective on the busy, industrialised nature of the modern city and to understand the battle between the expanding city space in the UK and our countryside. It explores a variety of other aspects of our life too by using big flashy graphs and charts and depicting the communication culture through new technology which shows the transmission of phone lines as the country wakes up. It comes on with a whole host of further little tidbits like that but, as always with documentaries about technology, it all feels slightly cold and ominous.
The nature documentaries have a personal touch to them that provide warmth and a degree of romaticism through the images of natural wonders. This just can't replicate that so the series can never elevate above being an interesting diversion rather than a groundbreaking piece of mastery. Marr himself is obviously hugely enthusiastic about the whole thing but unfortunately this comes across through him yelling almost every line he has. This, coupled with a loud and over-cooked style of editing that ties it to modern BBC News, just stops Marr and his passion from becoming our new household names and places this rather closer to an American style of factual television rather than our own, superior style.
EXTRAS ** A behind-the-scenes featurette and a making-of featurette, the latter of which essentially amounts to just another Andrew Marr-fronted documentary.