Weekend Argus (Saturday Edition)
Man bonds with wild octopus
A NEW documentary is set to give audiences a window to a mystical bond between a human and his octopus friend.
My Octopus Teacher releases on September 7 and journeys through the entire lifetime of this animal.
“A lot of people say an octopus is like an alien, but the strange thing is, as you get closer to them you realise that we are very similar in a lot of ways,” said Craig Foster, co-founder of the Sea Change Project.
The feature documentary is a collaboration between the Sea Change Project, an NGO raising awareness on the beauty and ecological importance of South Africa’s kelp forest, Off the Fence Productions based in the Netherlands and Netflix.
The underwater journey in Cape Town, off the shores of Cape Point, was directed by Pippa Ehrlich and James Reed and produced by Foster who is an award-winning film-maker.
My Octopus Teacher shows how Foster, who suffers from a loss of purpose, begins a daily diving regimen in the freezing kelp forests at the tip of Africa in order to re-energise himself; and through which he makes a majestic discovery.
The captured beauty of this animal’s entire life, something seldom achieved in the wild, let alone underwater, was shot over a year and explored the habits and personality of this creature that most of us have only ever eaten.
“At the time I didn’t know that I witnessed something extraordinary. You think, what on earth is this animal doing? And I think she was a little bit afraid of me,” said Foster in the film.
He asked himself during this journey: “What if I just went every day? What happens if I never missed a day?”
In his first few encounters, the octopus came at the camera with a type of shield in form of a shell-like object, in fear of the camera attacking. She (the octopus) eventually started touching, feeling and tasting the camera.
“You couldn’t leave it there for too long or she would just pull the thing over,” Foster said in amazement.
He said that the animal can look spikey, smooth and grow horns on its head. They can match colour, texture and patterns.
One encounter he observed while documenting was that she changes into an extraordinary wobbly, flowy old lady in a dress. “Perhaps she is trying to mimic kelp or algae moving in a swirl,” he explained.
He said the animal probably realised, “this thing (a human) is not dangerous”, so she goes to interact with this human.
She has 2000 suckers and uses them independently. “How do you do that when you have 2 000 fingers? You can compare her intelligence to a cat or a dog,” said Foster.
Elrich said having the privilege of capturing Foster’s relationship with the octopus had been a deeply fulfilling experience. The film-makers hope that the documentary will contribute to the global campaign to protect 30% of our oceans by 2030.
Elrich said there were many challenges directing the film. “For me was that I never did a project of this magnitude before. I had to work extra hard to make up for lack of experience,” she said.
The documentary has also captivated film festivals and competition judges globally. It racked up eight nominations, more than any other film in this year’s Jackson Wild Media Awards, an international nature film competition.
“I am hugely grateful for the nominations and overwhelmed by the responses we’ve had from viewers all over the world who have seen the film. We started this project to share our experiences of the seaforest,” said Elrich.