Isabella Rossellini has produced a group of short videos (two minutes long) for the Sundance Channel about the sex lives of animals. She gets to dress up in all kinds of costumes and interact with bizarre creatures. The films are actually very good, with lots of solid science and natural history behind them. You can find the website here, with information about the series as well as five videos. I can’t say they’re not salacious, but they’re fun.
You can read an interview with Rossellini about the series on Salon. An excerpt:
How did you come up with the idea for the series?
Robert Redford [founder of the Sundance Film Festival] came up with the idea that the Internet might offer the opportunity to relaunch the short film series format, which had disappeared. The other thing is that Sundance is very interested in the environment. I’d just worked with them on a project called “My Dad Is 100 Years Old,” that I wrote about my father, Roberto Rossellini, and they offered me the opportunity to do these short films about the environment.
Just what is needed. Lets shorten Americans’ attention span so it is no longer than 5 seconds – that is my goal.
All they need to pay attention to: “want fries with that?”
/sarcasm
Sounds a bit like the excellent Dr Tatiana’s sex advice for all creation.
I particularly like the button beetles. They lay unfertilised eggs which hatch as males. The female then mates with them and eats them. Always good for arguing with those who claim a behaviour is immoral if it is unatural – incest and canabalism in one go 🙂