It’s good to see Warner Brothers embracing the early spring to release IMAX 3D films. This year it’s Born To Be Wild, last year it was the Hubble telescope featurette. Born To Be Wild 3D takes full advantage of the medium and represents a special title for people into animals. Similarly the Disney studios releases an  animal or planet related doc around Earth Day.

Born To Be Wild, playing exclusively at the Houston Museum of Natural Science IMAX auditorium, gives the audience a first hand look at the rehabilitation of orphaned elephants and orangutans. Morgan Freeman narrates, which just lends credence for the Mike Myers debacle The Love Guru also using Freeman’s voice as a narrator.

Born To Be Wild gears more towards the academic museum audience than a broad audience, which is not a bad thing. There is attention to detail in infant elephants and orangutans, as well as the regions they come from (Africa and Indonesia). The photography of IMAX films is unparalleled, in fact one shot that has nothing to do with animals, a single engine airplane flying over a vast heartland, was so breath taking it took over the animal element of this film and converted it into a nature moment.

Born To Be Wild chronicles two women who’ve devoted their lives to the preservation of charity for animals and for that they are to commended. When the film shows photographs of them as young femmes in their jungle element and then contrasts that to their present gray-haired eminence the realization of how they’ve lived a life dedicated to a single mission becomes crystal clear. Quite frankly, this is an IMAX short that features a lot of animals, well, monkeying around.

- Michael Bergeron