19 March, 2020
Your thumb is aching from scrolling through Instagram, you've read that stack of magazines and you've worked as much Marie-Kondo magic on your wardrobe as possible. Perhaps it's time for a spot of Netflix? Throw on those joggers and settle in for some couch-surfing: these are our go-to series when we've got itchy feet.
If you want to know what goes into a brilliant travel photo, watch this series. Follow a handful of photographers from North America and Australia on their assignments across the world - including documenting ancient Aboriginal rock sites outside Victoria and close-ups with anacondas in Brazil. It's produced by National Geographic, so you can expect on-the-money information and epic vistas.
By extraordinary, they mean showy. In each episode, hosts Piers Taylor and Caroline Quentin hone in on one exceptionally grandiose pad. The analysis offered is probably a little light for architecture buffs, but the buildings featured are always closely tied to their destinations and utterly swoon-worthy. There are 12 hours to consume - a day's content for serious bingers.
This Netflix own-brand take on Planet Earth is produced by Keith Scholey (the brains behind the seminal BBC program), narrated by David Attenborough and covers similar ground. The real difference is the focus on humanity's environmental impact. Episodes cover ecological issues with a global scope, be it the depletion of rainforests or lack of access to clean drinking water.
If your cupboards are looking a little depleted, it might not be a good idea to watch this show. You'll work up an appetite in no time as you dip into these half-hour episodes which each focus on a different destination - most are in southeast Asia - and its respective street vendors. Thought snails were exclusively a French delicacy? The Ho Chi Minh City episode says otherwise.
Why are we all so obsessed with sites of death and tragedy? How can we justify our obsession with the macabre? Do we even need to? Dark Tourist aims to answer these questions and more. Over the course of eight, 40-minute episodes, journalist David Farrier observes the ritual cleaning of a mummified corpse in Indonesia, visits a voodoo festival in Benin and explores a host of haunted nuclear sites in the 'stans. It's voyeurism at it's best, one of those things that leaves you slack-jawed.
Not kinetic art, like an Alexander Calder mobile, but moving art as in waterfalls and other natural phenomena. It's the dreamy camerawork of filmmaker Louie Schwartzberg. He paints an epic picture of North America in series one - its rust-coloured deserts, looming forests and wild coasts - while the following two see him venture further afield.
