National Geographic - SuperCroc

Starring:Sam Neill
Studio: Nat'l Geographic Vid
Product Type: DVD

Editorial Review:
Amazon.com
Narrated by Sam Neill, National Geographic's SuperCroc is a crash course in all things crocodile. Although it's sure to appeal to those with an interest in prehistoric life, it's as much about the present as the past, since crocodilians still roam the earth and Sarcosuchus imperator wasn't much different--just a whole lot bigger (40 feet long). Paleontologist Paul Sereno would like to learn everything he can about the crocodile bones he has unearthed in the Sahara, so he and reptile expert Brady Barr travel the world in an attempt to re-create the life of the giant creature (animation also helps tell the story). The result is that Sereno is able to have a life-size model built. SuperCroc is a fascinating program that doesn't stint on details. Consequently, it isn't for the very young (6 or younger) as the footage of crocs chomping down on large mammals may prove disturbing. --Kathleen C. Fennessy
Description
In the parched Sahara desert, Dr. Paul Sereno uncovers the skull of a ten-ton giant SuperCroc, the size of a school bus and one of the largest crocs to have lived. Sereno joins forces with reptile expert Dr. Brady Barr for an around-the-globe adventure-packed quest to flesh out this ancient 40-foot croc. Computer animation takes viewers back in time to see how SuperCroc might have lived and battled for its food.

National Geographic - SuperCroc
Average customer rating:

down load took 2 hours

Math teachers

Great Movie about Prehistoric Croc

Jurassic Park meets the Croc Hunter

Too close to Spoof for comfort

National Geographic - SuperCroc
Starring: Sam Neill
Manufacturer: National Geographic Video
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: B00005Y71O
Release Date: 2002-03-19

Amazon.com

Narrated by Sam Neill, National Geographic's SuperCroc is a crash course in all things crocodile. Although it's sure to appeal to those with an interest in prehistoric life, it's as much about the present as the past, since crocodilians still roam the earth and Sarcosuchus imperator wasn't much different--just a whole lot bigger (40 feet long). Paleontologist Paul Sereno would like to learn everything he can about the crocodile bones he has unearthed in the Sahara, so he and reptile expert Brady Barr travel the world in an attempt to re-create the life of the giant creature (animation also helps tell the story). The result is that Sereno is able to have a life-size model built. SuperCroc is a fascinating program that doesn't stint on details. Consequently, it isn't for the very young (6 or younger) as the footage of crocs chomping down on large mammals may prove disturbing. --Kathleen C. Fennessy

Description

In the parched Sahara desert, Dr. Paul Sereno uncovers the skull of a ten-ton giant SuperCroc, the size of a school bus and one of the largest crocs to have lived. Sereno joins forces with reptile expert Dr. Brady Barr for an around-the-globe adventure-packed quest to flesh out this ancient 40-foot croc. Computer animation takes viewers back in time to see how SuperCroc might have lived and battled for its food.

Customer Reviews:

down load took 2 hours.......2007-03-03

not even feature length size movie and it took over two hours and hogged my lap top. i won't be down loading from unbox until the speeds are increased and a price drop for movies.

Math teachers.......2006-02-16

For me, the appeal of a video on humungous crocodiles would be to actually see them in their glory, in their environment, in action. The producers of this video chose not to travel back in time a few hundred million years with their cameras. Perhaps that trip would have strained their budget. Well excuuuuuse me.

Since they took the lazy way out, and simply followed some present day archaeologists and croc-workers, the least they could have done was to offer us a mega-million dollar computer recreation of these supercrocs in action in their native environment. But nooooooo.

What we're left with is just those archaelogists and crocologists, and a clay sculpture of a supercroc that doesn't even eat people. Where's the fun in that? They could have at least had the clay croc with moveable jaws and have it eat a few of the extras.

So we see some regular guys in the Sahara chipping away at bones in the sand and wimpily complaining about a little heat. So it's 120 degrees out. Big deal. I can't feel it. Bunch of gurly men.

Then they ride crocodiles. So they can measure their heads and bodies. So they can determine the mathematical ratio between a croc's head and its body. So they can estimate the body length of the supercroc whose skull they have found. But mostly, so they can have the fun of riding crocodiles, and have something interesting to put on the video. Yee hah! Giddyup croc.

Here are some of the interesting facts I learned from this video. If you call a croc by its name it will come to you and beg for food like a cat. Not that any cat or dog I ever had ever knew its name and responded to it. I didn't own my pets. They owned me. Who was doing all the work? Who was supplying the food? Who was lazing around the house all day? Think about it. Just who is working for who?

At one point, a guy stuck his arm into the mouth of a sedated croc, all the way in, and right to its stomach, and we get to see the inside of the croc. It had a lot of worms in it. Makes me wonder about you. Do you have worms inside you as well? I think you do.

Why did he do that? To recover a little machine he planted inside that very croc previously. And what did he learn from that informative experiment? I donno. He didn't say. What I learned from it is that I probably have worms in me. Not as big as the worms in you though.

I think I know why they didn't go back in time hundreds of millions of years to show Supercroc eating dinosaurs by the seashore. It is because it is all just a question of scale. What's the difference between a supercroc eating a dinosaur and a regular modern croc eating your high school math teacher? Not a lot. It's just a question of scale. Big guy eating big guy, little guy eating little guy, it will look pretty much the same on camera.

Great Movie about Prehistoric Croc.......2005-03-26

This is a very educative movie about the prehistoric croc that was probably about 35-40 feet in length and weighed about ten tons. Starting from the Discovery of the Skelton of this supercroc's skull to various observations and calculations taken from watching the dimensions and different behavious of the Crocs around the globe and finally leading to the estimated model of the Supercroc based on these averages. The movie is quite advenurous and looks rational. Another National geographic classic. Must see the Model of Supercroc Designed in the end of the movie. Wow What a great Supercroc.

Jurassic Park meets the Croc Hunter.......2003-08-01

Although the focus of this program is Sarcosuchus, the fossil "SuperCroc" of what is now the Sahara, it includes a great deal of information on contemporary crocodylians through "Croc-Hunteresque" segments in all sorts of interesting places. Particularly striking are a night croc "hunt" in Costa Rica, and Adam Britton's unique method of inserting and removing sensors into and out of a Saltwater Croc's stomach (by hand - you won't believe it 'til you see it).

Recovering the animal's fossilized skull is covered at some length and in such a way as to convey the tension inherent in recovering such a heavy, cumbersome, delicate, and valuable chunk of rock without destroying it or hurting yourself. Paleontologist wannabes, take notes.

The now-familiar method of bringing extinct animals to life through computer animation is used, but it would have been nice if there had been somewhat more footage of this sort and it could have been more lifelike; say, something more like that in "Walking With Dinosaurs." Also, other giant crocodilians such as Deinosuchus and Purussaurus were never discussed. This is understandable, since it was about Sarcosuchus after all, but I, at least, would have welcomed some comparison.

Quibbles aside, it was well done and my kids and I still think it's a blast, even after watching it a half-dozen or so times. Now, if the traveling display would just come to Omaha. . . .

Too close to Spoof for comfort.......2002-04-14

The first few minutes give the impression of this documentary being a spoof. If this were not a National Geographic documentary, I'd still believe it was.
Details about the Supercroc are amazing and its ability to eat dinosaurs fully believable. Sadly, there were too few details about the 40-foot long crocodile; instead, the viwer is given a documentary that seems to spend about 90% of its time in praise of the amazing abilities of the people involved in the fact-finding required to link the supercroc to today's remaining species of crocodile. All could have been covered by a few lines of commentary explaining that there was detailed research on the likely similarities of size (and predetory instincts) of present-day breeds of crocodile and the supercroc: however, that was not the case; so be it! But, to collect the required comparative data, the crocodile-hunting scenes seemed so lacking in safety for the people involved that I remain somewhat discomforted about why National Geographic endorsed such amateur displays (including one crocodile hunter stepping on the nose of a crocodile and looking very fortunate indeed not to have become a crocodile meal!).
Praise is certainly due to the amazing sculpting of what the supercroc would have looked like in comparison to mere human beings but, overall, too much time was spent on looking at the self-glorification of the presenters rather than the awesome glory of the supercroc.

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