This was a delightful combination of a true life murder story and a portrait of a place vitally important in the history of science. A German couple flees human society and the hints of another approaching world war in the thirties. He is a World War I Veteran and a retired doctor. She is an M.S. sufferer who idolizes the former doctor and aspiring Nietzchean philosopher. Both have left their respective spouses to come and live a Robinson Crusoe existence on one of the smaller of the Galápagos Islands. They are soon joined by another family and a woman travelling with two lovers who wants to build a hotel on the island. By the end of the period covered by the documentary the doctor and the hotel developer and both of her lovers are dead. Since the survivors wrote their memoirs and there was ample film footage of the Dramatis Personae, there is almost too much information. Yet at the end of the movie, we don't really know who killed who. We hear the words of each person, ably read by Cate Blanchett and other clear voiced German-accented people. We learn what became of the survivors and their children--who stayed and who went off on their own adventures. And during all this time, we see the animals of the Galapagos climbing over the rocks, gently eating from people's hands, less savage than the humans.
