Good film. A documentary about the excavation of the Jarkov mammoth, which was found about a decade ago in Siberia – what they hope will turn out to be a complete mammoth frozen in the tundra permafrost. It was cut out of the ground in a big block, and will be unfrozen bit by bit as the paleontologists (and other scientists: paleobotanist, etc.) see what’s inside in a very methodical manner. Really interesting.

These people are also continuing to search the tundra for more fossil finds – work which can only go on a few months out of each year, because of weather constraints. There was also a lot of great information about the current understanding of what life was like for these Pleistocene mammals, and also some speculation about why they became extinct. My only criticism is that the animation was hideous, at least compared with BBCs. But this was a very informative and interesting film.

Actually, I’ve just remembered that I wanted to do a bit of searching to find out the current status of that project. The film ended with them having excavated only a few inches down into the block – it’s such painstaking work that it will take years to fully complete the excavation. But the film was about 5 years old, so they’ve surely made some progress since then. Google, here I come!

Also worth noting that this is the first Netflix film that we received and watched! W00t! (It’s already in the mail back to them, too, so a film about the Titanic will be dispatched in return).