Pete Tyjas watches a new film by Jonathan Tomlinson of Smokin Drag Productions
Jonathan Tomlinson, a well-travelled angler, embarks on a journey that takes us across a broad spectrum of fishing destinations.
From the trout streams of Iceland and New Zealand where we see some amazing footage of rising trout to the flats of Christmas Island and Ascension Bay, Mexico where we see tailing bonefish, permit, angry GTs and Tarpon. The film ends on the chalk streams of the UK which ties everything up nicely.
We are lucky to be in the company of some wonderful anglers like Charles Jardine and Paul Procter as they talk us through the location they are fishing, some of the tactics they use and what it means to them.
JT, as he is known, could easily have made this a “fish porn” type of movie about sizeable fish in exotic destinations but he does more than that. He makes sure the host of each destination conveys much about the location they are in, the people, the wildlife and the culture too. This is important and takes us away from what could easily become a predictable plot.
When one of the anglers catches a fish there are no high fives or whoops, we are allowed to encroach on the moment of capture between just the angler and the fish before it is released. It is sensitively and thoughtfully shot.
I particularly enjoyed the drone footage on the flats in Mexico where we see an angler casting to some moving bonefish.
Making a film about one destination must be a difficult task but doing it in five destinations must have been a herculean effort and I salute that. Editing it to an hour's viewing must have also taken some doing.
Do I have any criticisms? Not really. The term getting “beaten up” by the fish was used just a little too often but hey, let's face it, these sorts of fish in these sorts of destinations are the type that do beat you up. As someone who has fished in a number of these places and has been “beaten up” by them, I think, on balance I’ll let it slide.
You can rent A Year In The Life from Vimeo for 48 hours for £5.99 or buy it again via Vimeo for £9.99 which can be downloaded to any platform.
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