Documentary AreaSimply the best Documentaries

Join David Attenborough on an extraordinary voyage into the hidden world beneath the waves. With unmatched storytelling and unparalleled access to remote ocean realms, he unveils a new era of marine discovery. Through breathtaking visuals and compelling narratives, the documentary exposes both the fragile beauty of ocean life and the grave challenges it faces. Yet, amid the threats, a powerful message of hope emerges — revealing nature's remarkable resilience and the inspiring efforts that could restore the oceans for future generations.

Sir David Attenborough presents Asia, an epic seven-part series that takes viewers on an extraordinary journey through the vast and diverse landscapes of the largest continent on Earth. From snow-capped mountain ranges and ancient forests to searing deserts and rich coastlines, this groundbreaking series reveals the astonishing wildlife and hidden natural wonders that define Asia’s breathtaking beauty and complexity.
The adventure begins in spectacular fashion beneath the surface of Asia’s oceans. In this visually stunning first episode, we dive into a world few have seen—an underwater realm filled with vibrant coral gardens, mysterious sunken ruins, and pristine marine habitats untouched by time. Alongside renowned marine scientists and local experts, we encounter majestic whale sharks, soaring manta rays, ancient sea turtles, glowing jellyfish, and otherworldly nudibranchs. But as we uncover the secrets of these magical ecosystems, we also face the urgent environmental challenges that threaten their survival. Awe-inspiring and thought-provoking, this opening episode sets the tone for a series that is as visually dazzling as it is vital to understanding the future of our natural world.

Fly across iridescent tropical reefs, brush through a cloud of a million jellyfish, visit an alien world where the closer you look, the more you see, where the tiniest creatures support the greatest predators... We think of reefs as exotic, distant places with little or no connection to our everyday world. Yet every reef is a living city beneath the sea with a parallel existence to ours, distant yet undeniably connected. Reefs are hotspots of biodiversity as vital to life on earth as the rain-forests. They have been shaping our shorelines, literally forming islands and mountains, for millions of years. The fossil record shows that given time they have recovered from all of earth's major extinction events. Even reefs pulverised by atomic blasts at Bikini Atoll have regenerated. Yet within our lifetime reefs have come to face their greatest threat...

The cycle of life of a handful of different animals is captured on film in a whole new way in this documentary. Using special motion-control photography equipment, Genesis allows filmgoers to view animal behaviors which are too small, too slow, or too difficult to normally be seen with the naked eye, including a chick hatching its way out from inside an egg, jellyfish drying into nothing under the heat of the sun, or a snake slowly swallowing prey bigger than itself. This footage is accompanied by narration from Sotigui Kouyate, who uses simple props and easily understandable analogies to explain the science behind what its shown on screen. Genesis was directed by Claude Nuridsany and Marie Perennou, who previously created another acclaimed scientific documentary, Microcosmos.

The big blue is the world's greatest wilderness, far from shore and many kilometres deep. It's a vast marine desert where there is little to eat and nowhere to hide. Yet it's home to some of the biggest and most spectacular creatures on earth. This episode reveals what it takes to survive in this savage and forbidding world. We witness feats of incredible endurance, moments of high drama and extraordinary acts of heart-wrenching self-sacrifice. Every animal in the big blue must find their own unique way to survive. Sperm whales have the largest brains in the world. They live for 80 years, and we are only now beginning to learn the extraordinary complexity of their language of clicks - thought to coordinate the whole family in everything from childcare to hunting. With special pressure-proof cameras, we witness record-breaking feats of endurance as they hunt for squid a kilometre down into the abyss. Only recently have we begun to solve the mystery of where baby turtles disappear to in their early years. They leave the crowded waters of the coast and head to the open ocean, where they use floating debris like logs as life rafts. Here they remain until adulthood, adrift on the high seas in relative safety away from coastal predators. Over half of all animals in the open ocean drift in currents. Jellyfish cross entire oceans feeding on whatever happens to tangle with their tentacles. The jelly-like Portuguese man-of-war can harness sail power to fish with its deadly tentacles. Sometimes there is a brief explosion of food in this marine desert, but ocean hunters must be fast to make the best of this bonanza. We witness super pods of up to 5,000 spinner dolphins racing to herd vast shoals of lanternfish, briefly caught at the surface where it is thought they spawn. New aerial footage reveals, for the first time, the truth to a centuries-old sailors' legend of the 'boiling seas' - the spectacular feeding frenzy of 90kg tuna and dolphins smashing through the lantern fish shoals turning the sea white with foam.

Far from land, where few of us ever venture, is the ocean beyond the boundary of any country. Largely ungoverned, wild, and lawless. Venture into the deep, dark and desolate oceans that are home to an abundance of beautiful - and downright strange - creatures.