If "My Octopus Teacher" does win the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature as predicted, (it's already won the BAFTA),I don't think I'll be complaining even if I think "Collective" the better film and the more worthy winner but that's only because "Collective" tells the more important story and is the more radical film. "My Octopus Teacher" is fairly radical, too, and as documentary filmmaking goes it's a beautiful job of work with some of the finest 'natural' cinematography I've ever seen, ("Blue Planet" eat your heart out).

It even has a plot of sorts and two leading players. One is Craig Foster, an explorer and cinematographer whose daily dives to a kelp forest in the seas off South Africa leads him to the films second character, a female octopus that Foster becomes very attached to and who, it would appear, becomes very attached to him, literally at times. Octopuses, it turns out, are highly intelligent creatures and Foster's octopus seems more intelligent than most, an 'alien' creature that can recognize an individual human being and want to be with that human, albeit in her own natural environment.

Of course, the octopus is also a wild animal in a wild, natural environment and much as he might want to Foster knows he can do nothing to change that; as we say, he has to let nature take its course while at the same time allowing himself to be 'taught' by the octopus, taught not just to care about the octopus itself but creatures in general and, strange as it may seem, interacting with this creature brough Foster closer to his own son. Superbly photographed and edited, its only falut lies in Foster's rather deadpan narration. He may be a nice guy but is somewhat dull in his delivery; luckily his camera speaks volumes.

My Octopus Teacher (2020) was co-written and co-directed by Pippa Ehrlich and James Reed.

It stars Craig Foster and a female octopus that lives in the frigid waters at the southern tip of South Africa. (Craig's son, Tom, has a small role.)

After Foster finds the octopus, he visits her den every day--literally. After a while she becomes accustomed to his presence, and appears to accept him as a companion. (It's very difficult to avoid anthropmorphism when watching a nature film. However, I was convinced that there really was two-way relationship between the human and the invertebrate.

For the record, I don't usually enjoy nature films. I liked this one because of the interaction between human and octopus. (It's the same reason I like Bronx Zoo--it's as much about humans interacting with animals as it is about the animals themselves.)

My Octopus Teacher has a strong IMDb rating of 8.2. I agreed and rated it 9.

P. S. My close friend told me I'd like "the octopus movie." I dutifully looked for that movie, and found a science-fiction movie about a giant octopus that could entrap and sink huge ships. This movie is not that movie.

Beautiful images, heartbreaking story, and ...I will definitely never eat octopus again....