VIDEO: Wild animals in the metropolis. Their life is approaching the new film Planeta Praha
The film Planeta Praha, which opens in Czech cinemas on August 4, presents the unexpected diversity of Prague’s nature. In the film, viewers will see more than fifty animal and plant species fighting for their place in the development of the capital city. Filmmakers watched them for a total of two years in all seasons. The adventure for the stories of animals and plants is the work of director Jan Hoška, producer Radim Procházka and ten cameramen led by Jiří Petr.
Illustrative photo.
| Photo: Lesy hl. m of Prague
The capital city at the birth of the motion picture, which also cost money. “I am very happy for the creation of this film from the renowned authors of Planeta Česko. The film engagingly depicts life in our capital from another point of view. How many plants and animals will continue to live with us in the city and how diverse they will be is also a matter of our approach to and care for Prague’s outdoor environment. It also applies to our way of caring for trees and greenery and creating suitable conditions for individual species, be it insects, birds, meadow flowers, trees or bushes,” commented Jana Plamínková, councilor for the environment and deputy mayor, on the film premiere.
Source: Youtube
The everyday adventures of the animal inhabitants of the metropolis were recorded by the filmmakers thanks to the most modern technologies from an exceptional proximity and perhaps unexpected places for some. For example, the green-footed warbler boldly nested in the sludge tank of the Bubeneč sewage treatment plant, the battle between mouflon males took place on the grounds of the Thomayer hospital in Krč, and the bush mouse was born not far from Franz Kafka’s grave at the New Jewish Cemetery. Petřín, an island of greenery in the very heart of the capital, is the exclusive Prague home of the great dormouse, which also visits the mirror maze there, and the Slatina reservoir in Dubč, in turn, serves as a roost for hundreds of thousands of Central Bohemian starlings.
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A relentless fight for food takes place at the Trojan Zoo, where gray herons sneak in for lunch and steal fish from pelicans. In the film, the audience will also see, for example, woodpeckers nesting in the arches of the Charles Bridge, the courtship of a hornet beetle in a restaurant in Malá Strana, wild pigs feeding at the drop-off point in Prosek, or slave ants in a housing estate in Ládví. And then there is also the never-freezing Vltava in Prague, which has caused some birds to stop migrating south, or Smíchovské nádraží, where specific types of plants resist the seemingly inhospitable environment.
“We were striving for a certain balance. For example, we didn’t want only birds in the film, even though they are usually a bit easier to shoot, but also mammals, insects, amphibians. We were also choosing a typical representative of some life strategy that helps them survive in the city. Some animals are lucky enough to not have to change their habits, while other species are able to adapt very flexibly to their new environment. And we wanted to show this variety in the film as well,” director Jan Hošek summed up the film’s philosophy.
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The diversity of the territory of the capital city, where so many animals and plants thrive, is also due to the Vltava River and its tributaries – on one side of the river canyon there are hot steppe localities, on the other, cooler deep forests. “Diversity is a specific feature of Prague not only within the Czech Republic, but also throughout Europe. Rarely can we find such a unique city in terms of the diversity of its territory. There are species bound to the steppe, wetlands, but also to primeval forests,” explained the film’s chief expert advisor, biologist Ondřej Sedláček.
The film Planeta Praha will be accompanied by a book of the same name from the Jakost publishing house.