On the bird level, Kimball captures a remarkable number of species in Central Park with some stunning HD photography in this brief but amazing 58-minute film.
The film also introduces some truly devoted NYC birders, including a group of old-school birders with the obligatory photo cannons, brass-instrument technician Chuck McAlexander, and septuagenarian bird-tour leader Starr Saphir -- a true matriarch of Central Park birdwatching who, sadly, has sucumbed to cancer since the film was shot, and who was once memorialized by TV's Conan "Coco" O’Brien when he joined one of Starr's locally-famous field trips.
Kimball looks at Central Park birding in all four seasons. But as expected, Spring and Fall migration are his "stars" when hundreds of birders converge to take advantage of the "Central Park Effect" -- shorthand for the observed phenomenon that as the earth becomes more urbanized and developed, migrating birds increasingly seek out islands of nature like Central Park.
This is, in the end, an HD film, so Kimball spends a lot of time on striking birds like Indigo Buntings, Rose-breasted Grosbeaks, Hooded Warblers, and the like but. But as veteran birder Lloyd Spitalnik sagely notes, "If you get tired of looking at the common birds, you might as well just pack it in." Indeed.
Then there's birder Chris Cooper, who says his friends don't see him from April 15th through Memorial Day. But if his friends question his annual obsession, Chris says he now counters by rattling off his "seven pleasures of birding":
- The beauty of the birds
- The beauty of being in a natural setting
- The joys of hunting, without the bloodshed
- The joy of collecting (in that the practice of keeping lists -- life lists, day lists, etc.-- appeals to the same impulse as, say, stamp collecting)
- The joy of puzzle-solving (in making those tough identifications)
- The pleasure of scientific discovery (new observations about behavior, etc.); and last but not least
- The "Unicorn Effect," by which Cooper refers to the phenomenon familiar to most birders -- the idea that there are birds you've heard of, or seen in books that capture your imagination, but you've never seen for yourself ... then one day, there it is in front of you, as if some mythical creature has stepped out of a storybook and come to life.
Is there a downside to this film? Just that it further enshrines Jonathan Franzen as the public face of American birding -- an unfortunate extension of Franzen's novels and essays he’s written for The New Yorker about his birding activities. Laura Helmuth's article at Slate.com does a good job of explaining what an embarrassment Franzen is to the rest of us birders. Sure, birders are all a bit obsessive-compulsive, and quite a few birders are socially retarded. But we don't need this untalented jerk out there scaring people away from birding with his self doubts and self-loathing, his guilt-tripping about time taken away from worthier pursuits, and so forth.
