Evolution: Changing to Survive, Movie Review Example

“What Darwin Never Knew” is a documentary film written by John Rubin that was released on PBS NOVA series in 2009.  It was later posted on Youtube by Gulo Edis on December 7, 2014 under the title, “DNA, Genetics, and Evolution: Documentary on the Living Science of Evolution”.   In the video, “What Darwin Never Knew”,   Nova asks the viewers to consider two essential and significant questions. They are, “why is there such a stunning diversity of life and how does it work”?  These puzzling questions are answered by extraordinary science that had its start over 150 years ago with Charles Darwin. Darwin was the first person to study why and how evolutionary changes took place. Today, he is known as the “father of evolution”.

In his 20”s, Darwin searched for his purpose in life. He had several failed attempts at a career in medicine and the clergy.  Finally, he took a job aboard the naval ship Beagle, and had an opportunity to travel to Argentina. It is here that he began collecting fossils of extinct mammals, which lead him to wonder what the relationship was to living mammals. However, Darwin made his most crucial discovery on the Galapagos Islands.  Here, he collected a variety of specimens of birds, turtles, iguanas, and penguins. Upon, finally returning to America, he began to sort his collections and came to a conclusion.  Many different varieties of, for example, birds had come from one single kind of finch.  These variations depended on the bird’s environment and had developed through many years, in response to the need for survival or protection. He rationalized that natural selection had allowed some birds to adapt and survive, while the weaker ones had died of. He called this idea, survival of the fittest. In order to gather more information about how these adaptive changes occurred, Darwin turned to examining embryos. He discovered that human embryos and fish embryos both began with the same slit in the head region. Realizing that humans developed bones of the inner ear and fish developed gills, Darwin theorized, that all species were connected.  His most controversial claim, that man is descended from apes was included in a book he published in1859, called “Origin of Species”.

Even though Darwin made significant discoveries about how evolution works, he still was unable to completely answer how it works.  This documentary helps Darwin to answer this question.  Scientist have now discovered that adaptations in animals occur because of DNA.  Unsurprisingly, when an offspring receives half of its DNA from its mother and half from its father, there will be changes. The second type of change occurs when mutations appear in the DNA during the replication process. “What Darwin Never Knew” delves even further into how these evolutionary changes take place. The scientists in the documentary made a miraculous discovery. Many adaptations or changes occurred when “switch” genes would turn a body feature on or off.  In “What Darwin Never Knew” switch genes caused mice fur to darken for camouflage and under belly barbs of fish to disappear.

Evolution is a slow, continuous process. Many generations from now we will study how humans have changed. With the temperatures of the earth rising, we might lose our hair as a cooling mechanism.  With people having allergies, we might even develop nostrils that can filter different smells.  What about people that eat a lot of fast food developing a faster metabolism as a means to combat obesity. Whatever evolutionary changes occur I hope are ones that will benefit us.  If the changes don’t work with our environment, we will become weak and die off.

Works Cited 

Edis, Gulo. “DNA, Genetics, and Evolution: Documentary on the Living Science of Evolution”. Online video clip. YouTube. YouTube, 7 December 2015. Web. 24 July 2015.  < https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1FpgHq5uGM>.