Super Nature: A Love Letter In Practice
In a world where species dwindle and climate disaster becomes the daily reality across our planet, to look at the natural world is to be witness to a fading memory. Super Nature, directed by Ed Sayers, is a poignant collection of images of the natural world integrally filmed in Super 8 format, bringing together over 40 worldwide collaborators into a collective meditation on nature and our place (and mark) in it.
Because of its technical characteristics, Super 8 is not generally used for nature filmmaking. It does not allow for shooting hours of footage or creating the curated, high-resolution frames that we can find in many documentaries or social media content. But as Sayers himself states from the very opening of Super Nature, he intends to look at nature in a different way, so it is only fitting to do so through an unconventional lens. The thread of scenes showcases the richness of flora and fauna from all over the world: monkeys, insects, seals, birds, marine life – and it is the format’s unique texture, paired with the atmospheric sound design, which uncovers a certain emotivity and lingering nostalgia in the footage, transforming every image into an echo of our present.
In nature, transformation is the only certainty. Memory, nostalgia and loss underpin Sayers’ narration and many of the collaborators’ personal stories, which they tell themselves as they present their footage. But this is not natural transformation: the film makes a point of questioning our place in the natural world, drawing attention to human-made harmful impact in the environment, as we are confronted with images of climate change-fuelled floodings, the ingent amounts of waste and plastic that are recovered in the middle of the Pacific ocean, miles away from the land, or how a glacier used to look not so long ago. We meet the last two remaining northern white rhinos as Zacharia, a collaborator from Kenya, tells about the local conservation efforts to save the species from extinction. All of these stories tell us two things: there is much to grieve, but still so much to care for and protect.
The brilliance of Super Nature stems from the fact that it is as much a love letter to nature as it is an exercise in sustainable creative practices, and the story of how the project itself was made is perhaps its most powerful narrative. A long-time enthusiast of the format, Sayers established the Super 8 filmmaking competition, ‘straight 8’, in 1999. It was French filmmaker Roger Batteault’s entry – evocative footage of a flamingo colony taking flight – that inspired him to pick up his own camera and go to the Norfolk Coast to film the seals. Fascinated by the experience, he began reaching out to a variety of filmmakers, conservationists, activists and even locals all over the world, providing them with Super 8 cameras and prompting them to explore and showcase their local environment on their own terms. These cameras are 50+ years old and were the only production element that travelled. Some of the local filmmakers, who had no Super 8 or nature filmmaking experience, were trained remotely. All of these production decisions resulted in a filming process that did not require international travel and did not need to disrupt local life.
As told by the collaborators, the limitations of the Super 8 format were actually a leeway for experimentation, a renovation of their sense of curiosity and relish for the unpredictable. The act of filming became the very act of seeing differently, and the narrative thread reveals it at an individual and collective level. Super Nature comments as much on nature as it does on connection: our own connection to earth, as a species, to our past and our future. As a species, the deeply distorted meaning of interconnection we live by seems to have severed us from the essence of our own existence. The entirety of the project reexamines how we engage with nature, but looking is not enough, especially in the face of human-made destruction. And creating the space for local people to look and understand their environment on their own terms is inseparable from sustainable living and creative practices. Ultimately, Super Nature as a project puts forward not only a “different way of seeing nature”, but a commitment to sustainability through its material practices, setting aside even the need to rely on high-tech footage and refusing any practices that damage and exploit in the name of culture.
The film itself doesn’t make this part of its story too explicit, perhaps wanting to stay a “love letter” to nature. With a UK and Ireland release date of September 4th, Ed Sayers has spent the past weeks on an unconventional preview tour, bike-packing and camping, as a way to reduce emissions and honour the film. In a way, this is the true love letter: not only looking at nature differently, but also at ourselves, our choices and responsibilities toward each other, and toward the generous home we have forgotten how to inhabit.
Edited by Isabella Greenaway, Co Film & TV Editor
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