Dinosaurs - In the realm of the giants

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Movie
German title Dinosaurs - In the realm of the giants
Original title Walking with Dinosaurs
Country of production United Kingdom
original language English
Publishing year 1999
Rod
Director Tim Haines ,
Jasper James
production Tim Haines

Dinosaurier - In the realm of the giants (Original title: Walking with Dinosaurs ) is a documentary TV series of the British BBC from 1999 about dinosaurs and other reptiles ( dinosaurs ) of the Mesozoic Era ( Mesozoic Era). The six-part mini - series , expanded by several specials, is the first part of a trilogy (the original titles begin with Walking with …) about extinct animals, followed by The Heirs of the Saurians and The Ancestors of the Saurians . It was first broadcast on German television on November 11, 1999 on ProSieben .

The actor Otto Clemens is the spokesperson for the German-language television series and the DVDs .

action

Animatronic of a Coelophysis used for the documentation

Dinosaurs - In the Realm of the Giants is, based on paleontological knowledge of life on Earth at the time of the Mesozoic (Mesozoic), the one geological era in which the dinosaurs dominated life on the mainland. In the six parts following the geological chronology , some dinosaurs and their relatives ( plesiosaurs and pterosaurs ) in the Triassic (including Placerias , Coelophysis , Peteinosaurus and Plateosaurus ), Jura (including Diplodocus , Allosaurus , Stegosaurus and Liopleurodon ) and the Cretaceous (including Ornithocheirus , Iguanodon , Leaellynasaura , Anatotitan , Torosaurus , Tyrannosaurus ).

Fresh blood

This episode, which takes place in the Upper Triassic , tells of the beginnings of the dinosaurs and shows them fighting for supremacy over the earth with the Rauisuchidae and Therapsids at that time . The focus is on the Coelophysis and a Cynodontia Thrinaxodon pair. The viewer experiences the successful hunt of a Postosuchus on a herd of Placerias and sees how the reptiles in the form of the Peteinosaurus also conquer the skies. Thanks to their adaptability and low water requirements, the dinosaurs gain dominance over the earth. At the end of the episode, the first large dinosaurs appear with a herd of Plateosaurus .

The time of the titans

In this episode, set in the late Jurassic , the focus is on a Diplodocus herd and their social behavior . A mother lays its eggs in the forest so that the young are protected from large predatory dinosaurs such as the Allosaurus . Nevertheless, some young animals are eaten by an Ornitholestes , a small predatory dinosaur. A few years later, the group of young Diplodocus approaches dangerously close to the edge of the forest. They will witness how a Stegosaurus successfully fends off an attack by an Allosaurus. Furthermore, the symbiosis between the Diplodocus and the flying reptile Anurognathus is discussed. After a forest fire only three pups survived and only the appearance of a group of brachiosaurs saves them from an attack by the allosaurs. Another young animal disappears, what happened to him is not specified. The last two pups can join a herd of adult Diplodocus.

A cruel sea

This episode is mainly devoted to life in the seas of the Upper Jurassic . A herd of Ophthalmosaurus is accompanied on the way to their breeding grounds. They are endangered by sharks of the genus Hybodus and the gigantic pliosaur Liopleurodon . The Cryptoclidus is represented with a way of life similar to that of today's seals. In addition to the marine reptiles, a marine pterosaur is presented with the Rhamphorhynchus . This feeds on fish and the spawn of horseshoe crabs . The only dinosaur that occurs is the Eustreptospondylus depicted as a predatory dinosaur swinging between small islands .

Under the wings of titans

In this episode, an old male ornithocheirus is accompanied on his last flight. He is resting in what is now Brazil near a Tapejara colony . Then he sets off for North America. A herd of Dakotadon migrating along the coast is shown accompanied by a Polacanthus . Arriving in Europe, the old male witnesses a group of Utahraptors killing an Iguanodon . The Iberomesornis indicates how the birds displace the flight reptiles. Due to hunger and overheating, the ornithocheirus male dies during the mating fight for females.

The focus of this episode is on pterosaurs and takes place in the Lower Cretaceous.

The spirits of the primeval forests

This episode describes the life of the animals that lived on the continent of Antarctica during the Middle Cretaceous . The protagonists are a herd of Leaellynasaura who are accompanied over a period of one year. The Australovenator , referred to as the dwarf allosaurus, is presented as the largest local predator and is proving to be an ongoing threat to the Leallynasaura herd. The Muttaburrasaurus, who live like nomads, only migrate to the Leaellynasaura in summer. The Koolasuchus is a relic from times gone by when amphibians ruled the world. He hunts small dinosaurs. The steropodon shows that mammals have also produced large species.

The fall of the dynasty

The last episode deals with the extreme volcanism at the end of the Cretaceous Period and its influence on the dinosaurs using the example of Tyrannosaurus and Torosaurus and finally with the meteorite impact that made the dinosaurs (except for the birds ) extinct.

They are accompanied by a female tyrannosaurus who is looking for a male after an unsuccessful brood. She finds this on the carcass of a young triceratops . After a successful mating, it has a clutch again and is terrorized by egg-consuming mammals, the Didelphodons and the raptor Dromaeosaurus . The spectacular fight between two torosaurs is also shown. With the Quetzalcoatlus one of the last pterosaurs is shown, because this group was ousted by the birds. A herd of Edmontosaurus that eventually encounters a lake is shown foraging for food. The Deinosuchus , giant crocodiles, live in the water . The female tyrannosaurus attacks the herd and kills an Edmontosaurus. It is then shown that the brood was successful this time and that the female feeds and protects her three young. Later, however, there is no trace of the smallest, and an ankylosaurus fatally injures the female. The following morning the meteorite hits the earth.

Award

Special offers

In 2001 and 2002 two specials on dinosaurs - In the realm of giants were published .

2001 appeared The story of Big Al (English original title: The Ballad of Big Al ). This special tells the biography of an Allosaurus named Big Al .

Another special was published in 2002. Under the name Im Reich der Gianten (English original title: Chased by Dinosaurs ) the zoologist Nigel Marven makes a fictional journey back in time to the Middle Ages in order to solve the riddle of the “giant claw” of Therizinosaurus and the “battle of the giants “ To experience between Giganotosaurus and Argentinosaurus in today's Argentina .

In 2003 Marven also appeared as a zoologist on a journey through time in the BBC-produced documentary series Monster of the Deep . The series Prehistoric Park (2007) was also produced with him .

In 2013 a movie was released with Dinosaurier 3D - Im Reich der Gianten . In contrast to the series, the animals can speak.

Background information, production and quotas

When filming began , Tim Haines , the producer of the series, faced the difficulty of finding a suitable location for the landscape shots, because in the Mesozoic there was no grass that is now almost worldwide. Therefore it had to be avoided in areas such as New Zealand , the Bahamas , New Caledonia , Chile , California , the Canary Islands (Santa Cruz de La Palma , Tenerife ) and Australia .

With the help of computer-generated imagery (CGI), the animals were animated , only for close-ups was in 3D - animations omitted because their effect was not considered to be sufficiently realistic. Animatronica was used in their place . The production cost 18 million US dollars and is still one of the most expensive documentary series in television history .

The first broadcast on German television, spoken by Otto Clemens, was followed by six million viewers. In the United States, the premiere had the highest rate of the Discovery Channel in the station's history.

In Germany, two of the six parts are usually shown in one broadcast , with one episode lasting around 30 minutes. The series was released on VHS cassette and DVD . A book on the series has been published with the participation of paleontologist Martin Sander as a scientific advisor.

literature

The live show

"Live Show"
The live show "Dinosaurs - In the Empire of Giants" in the Festhalle Frankfurt.

The live show “Walking With Dinosaurs” or “Dinosaurs - In the Empire of Giants” based on the films was performed in 2009 and 2010 in Berlin, Mannheim, Cologne, Hanover, Hamburg, Munich, Nuremberg and Vienna. Another tour stopped in early 2013 in Leipzig, Oberhausen, Frankfurt, Vienna, Stuttgart and Munich.

See also

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Dinosaurs - In the Empire of the Giants in the Internet Movie Database (English)
  2. ↑ TV feature film online
  3. ↑ An interview with a paleontologist: "Dinofilms are not bad as a thought aid" . On Spiegel Online , May 18, 2000. Last accessed on February 20, 2013
  4. ↑ Press kit for the 2013 show  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Accessed February 4, 2013, 8:31 PM GMT + 1@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / www.dinosaurier-live.de