Challenge in Nature – The Movie: Safari Mess – Trailer
(Courtesy: Netflix)
Eight years old and four years old.
“If they like the series, then they’re going to go completely crazy over the film. We took it to the next level. The decisions, the results, everything’s bigger. But the goal always remains the same: to help young people make the right decisions under pressure, to be resourceful, to understand what it is. “Risk. This time we wrapped it around the issue of nature conservation, an issue that is very close to me personally.”
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Please, children, help the bar stay alive. From “Challenge in Nature – The Movie: A Mess on a Safari”
(Photo: Courtesy of Netflix)
Consistently, my kids make the most wrong decisions when they watch a series. I already suspect they just do not want it to end.
“Listen, I can tell you that at least the movie has one secret decision-making path that if they take it, it will not end well for them. That’s all I can say. Oh, tell your kids to try to keep me alive if possible.”
Edward Michael “Bar” Grills (46) was born in Northern Ireland and grew up on the Isle of Wight, the son of Conservative MP Michael Michael Grills, and Lady Sally Grills, herself a member of MP Patricia Ford. After being educated at some of the best boarding schools and schools in the country – including the elitist Eaton College – he began attending university, and then joined the British Army. From childhood he was attracted to extreme sports and martial arts, and in his youth he learned to climb mountains, sailboats and skydiving, and even reached the status of a black belt Dan 2 in karate. All of this led him to serve as a reservist in the British Special Forces – and not for nothing, but in the commando unit considered by all, the SAS, where he served for three years as a paratrooper, survival guide and medic.
In 1996, two years after enlisting, Grills was injured when his parachute opened only partially during a parachute jump in South Africa, at an altitude of about 500 meters. He broke three vertebrae in his spine, and was very close to being paralyzed for life. It took 18 months until he completed his rehabilitation and returned to his life. “Sometimes it takes a beating to make you understand what’s really important to you,” he told the British Telegraph in an interview. “I left the hospital with a fire inside me to live life with courage and gratitude. I got a second chance, and it doesn’t always happen.”
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From “Challenge in Nature – The Movie: A Mess on a Safari”
(Photo: Courtesy of Netflix)
After leaving the hospital, Grills continued his adventurous career, which led him to many accomplishments. In 1998 he entered the Guinness Book of Records as the youngest Briton to ever climb Mount Everest. He was only 23 years old, and less than two years have passed since his severe injury. A year earlier, the first Briton to climb to the top of the mountain was the infamous Mother Deblam – also in the Himalayas. And the adventures also continued into the new millennium: in 2003 Grills and four other adventurers crossed the North Atlantic in a rubber dinghy; In 2005 he crossed the jungle surrounding the Angel Falls in Venezuela – the highest waterfall in the world, in a motorized parachute; In 2007, he flew a motorized parachute over the summit of Everest, and in 2008 he led another group of adventurers to climb a summit in Antarctica, but broke his shoulder while parachuting on ice and had to give up. And there are more and more adventures.
Naturally, the small screen winked at the ambitious Grills, who during the 2000s wound up in commercials and a variety of entertainment programs. In 2005 he began producing his own shows, first a documentary mini-series accompanying him and others during training as part of the Foreign Legion in the Sahara Desert, and later in the “Challenge in Nature” survival program that ran from 2006 to 2011 (eventually becoming Netflix’s interactive “Nature Challenge”). ). There, Grills demonstrated all the characteristics that would make him the big superstar of the field: a simple and effective format (grills are “abandoned” in a secluded place and need to be rescued), purposeful and accessible serving, and a willingness to go all the way in front of the cameras. In what he is willing to put in his mouth.
From here began a series of shows and specials for the Discovery and National Geographic channels, which made Grills a global celeb. Evidence of his new status was provided by the program “In Nature”, which began on NBC but moved to National Geographic, where Grills takes celebrities on nature survival trips – from Julia Roberts, through Zac Efron to former President Barack Obama.
But even after becoming a household name, Grills remained true to his tenets – a devout and devout Christian, head of the British Scout Association (a title held in Britain, which Grills – the youngest person appointed to a position in British Scout history – accepted in 2009), active in a variety of charities And conservation of the environment and nature, and father of three sons. And it may be that this, the last part, led him to the new stage in his career – a child star.
You changed phase.
“Look, we’re still running with our regular shows. There’s the show at National Geographic, where we take on challenges all sorts of Hollywood stars and famous athletes, which has become a major component there. But it was really fun to get to Netflix and create a show for the younger audience, and ‘ Nature’s Challenge ‘is the perfect way to do it. Shooting a show is like shooting a movie: you have to plan well and do everything two or three times. And it’s perfect for kids because you leave all the decisions in their hands. In all my other shows I’m the one who makes the decisions. .
How did the idea come about? It came up after “Black Mirror: Bendersnatch” came out and demonstrated the potential? Or have you played with it before?
“It’s the great power of Netflix, that they have the resources and technology to do things like that. They dipped their finger in the water with ‘Black Mirror’ and the first season of ‘Challenge in Nature’ – and the response was huge. ‘Challenge in Nature’ was one of Netflix’s most watched content. In his first half year on the air. It was very exciting to be a part of it. It’s a new thing. The guys from Netflix told me they’re building a plane while it’s in the air. And now I’m watching this movie we did, ‘Safari Mess’, and I can tell you that thing, in this technology “In this ambition, it has not yet been filmed. We all, the whole team, were so proud.”
The series came up on Netflix about a year ago with a pretty amazing timing – when everyone is stuck at home in closures and isolation, and this is actually the only way for the kids to go on an adventure in nature.
“Yes, the timing was right. The timing is always important. The program came out just when everyone around the world went into quarantine and were isolated. And you’re looking for something your kids can do. And here’s something that empowers them and is educational, and decisions remain in their hands. I think that’s the future of education: interactive I have three sons, and as a parent – so much of what you want is to teach children to make good decisions under pressure, in the important moments, to know when to be brave and when to restrain themselves. These are the things we, the adults, do. “We learn during our lives from failure, from experience. I definitely feel that the timing of the series was right, and I hope it helped, even if a little, for families to get through the closure.”
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Here, too, he eats creepy. From “Challenge in Nature – The Movie: A Mess on a Safari”
(Photo: Courtesy of Netflix)
Isn’t it tedious to shoot like that? Everything has to be photographed twice, so that there are two channels of choice?
“It was definitely more challenging to shoot than our other plans. Usually we take a piece of rope, some cameras, me and the guest, and we just run with it. Here it’s very different. A lot of the credit goes to the team that plans everything, because there are so many. “A lot of tasks and paths, and decisions and results. I myself can not keep track of everything. I’m much less complicated. For me it’s: ‘Okay, a lion is chasing you, you have eight seconds to get out of here, so crawl under the truck.'”
And work with all these animals? Isn’t this a nightmare?
“It’s a nightmare. They say ‘never work with children and animals’, but here it’s for children and there are animals in it, so maybe it’s just a half nightmare. But it does not matter to me. It’s the most ambitious project I’ve done, I look at it and I’m proud of what we did.” .
Warns I’m going to ask you something that many ask: What’s the most repulsive thing you’ve ever eaten during your adventures?
“I ate a lot of terrible things. Caterpillars and maggots, worms and snakes, camel stomach fluids … but what to do, if you want to survive in nature, you have to eat, you need protein. Put aside the perceptions you came with, there are hard things you will have to do. “And ‘You are against nature’ there were some repulsive things I ate. I think the worst of them were really big leeches. Whenever you eat leeches, you worry that maybe they will lock up somewhere down your throat and start sucking blood, and you will suffocate from it.”