Aquarela - Review

Rating: 4 out of 5

IT'S been described as the most dangerous documentary ever made - and it's easy to see why.

Victor Kossakovsky’s Aquarela is, by turns, a beautifully spellbinding ode to the beauty and power of water... and - perhaps more crucially - an eye-opening insight into the real effects of the climate crisis.

It's near-wordless in that it isn't narrated or even captioned - so many of the sequences require extended research to find out exactly what [and where] is being captured on film.

But whether you do or don't, the images speak for themselves. And they are truly hypnotic.

The film starts in Siberia, chronicling the work of a rescue crew whose job is to save cars and people who have fallen through the ice. The rescuers themselves communicate with each other in terms of incredulity - why are people here and risking their lives to drive across the frozen terrain? But that further investigation prompts the realisation that the danger stems from the fact that the ice is beginning to thaw three weeks earlier than normal, closing the window of opportunity for such motorists.

The sequence ends in devastating fashion - a moment captured on film to the point where Kossakovsky was forced to decide how much was too much to show.

But it leaves you in little doubt as to who is really in charge of this planet and its fate - and that is very much nature.

From there, the film takes us to ice cliffs and glaciers that are starting to collapse, often spectacularly - but at rates that are undeniably worrying.

We then see boats being tossed about the waves as crew members vy to stay safe, giant waves that feel lifted from Christopher Nolan's Interstellar and - as the cameras move from the open seas to inland - flooded landscapes in Venezuela and violent storm damage in Miami.

Just occasionally, the film - or rather, Koossakovsky's lens - seems to dwell a little too long on certain sequences (there is also an abstract quality to some that feel a little too artsy), while that lack of narration and explanation could be to the cost of the film's overall message (if you're not inclined to follow up).

But in the main, this is powerful and highly relevant filmmaking - one that vividly and sometimes beautifully showcases nature in all of its devastating power, while also sounding a warning bell to humanity about the consequence of continuing to ignore its roar.