Nick Pelios
Freediver, Creator
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Nick Pelios
Freediver, Creator
My Octopus Teacher is a new Netflix documentary, directed by Pippa Ehrlich and James Reed. It revolves around the relationship between Craig Foster (who is also the producer of the film) with an octopus and its life-changing attributes.
Here's how the story goes: in 2010, Foster started freediving in an UW kelp forest in South Africa. As he was filming his experiences, a young octopus caught his attention. After finding out its den, he started tracking it every day for months, and finally he won its trust. There are various magnificent scenes in the film, such as the one where the little octopus is attached by a pyjama shark which cost it an arm. The end of the film is close to heart-breaking and as we are not fans of spoilers, we'll let you find out for yourself.
In Craig's words "I remember the day when it all started, seeing this really strange thing. A lot of people say an octopus is like an alien, but the strange thing is as you get closer to them you realize that you're very similar in a lot of ways. It's a hard thing to explain but sometimes you just get a feeling and you know there's something to this creature that's very unusual. There's something to learn here. I had to have a radical change in my life and the only way i knew to do it was to be in this ocean with her. And then i had this crazy idea; what happens if i just went every day? But we realize that there's a line that can't be crossed. You start thinking about your own vulnerability, worried about your family or child. I hadn't been a person that was overly sentimental towards animals before, i realized i was changing my relationship with people, with humans. What she taught me was to feel that you are a part of this place, not a visitor. That's a huge difference".