‘Nocturnes’ Review: They Come at Night
In the forests of northeast India, an ecologist tracking moths creates a tiny oasis of light in the darkness.Early in the enlightened nature documentary “Nocturnes,” a simple cut captures the mix of micro and macro that its directors, Anirban Dutta and Anupama Srinivasan, explore.Mansi Mungee, a quantitative ecologist, is counting moths in the forests of northeast India by hanging a lamp-lit sheet of fabric for the insects to land on. One such setup becomes a tiny oasis of light in the woods, and then, suddenly, we see the moon. Through this visual play with scale, moths and humans are placed in perspective as fellow creatures on the same level in the cosmos.“Nocturnes” is about Mungee’s hard work as a scientist, scouting and watching, and it’s also about the land itself. This lush and gorgeous stretch of Arunachal Pradesh, its misty landscapes drizzled with rain, has its own life apart from the scientific observers who come to the area. Mungee is measuring the sizes of hawk moths at different elevations and the effects of changing temperatures, but the filmmakers allow our gaze to dwell on the arabesques of wings on the hanging sheets, or, by day, the ethereal tree cover.This isn’t nature as an orderly picture book. Mungee and her team at one point must smash fallen rocks to clear a road, and they patiently endure cold and damp weather. In the award-winning film’s sound design, the din of animals — rustling and fluttering, plus calls of all sorts — becomes a raucous narration of its own.The moths remain a puzzle of data that awaits analysis. Dutta and Srinivasan’s understated approach shows research and nature in action without pretending to make a forest give up its secrets.NocturnesNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 22 minutes. In theaters. More
