A close-up of a majestic golden eagle with a sharp, hooked beak and piercing eyes, set against a blurred blue-gray background. The eagle's dark feathers are highlighted by sunlight.
A golden eagle with outstretched wings gracefully approaches a snow-covered rocky cliff. The sky, dotted with a few clouds, adds to the grandeur of the majestic and alpine scene unfolding in the background.
Two foxes are curled up together, sleeping in a small, cozy den covered by rocks and greenery, while a golden eagle soars overhead, scanning the tranquil landscape.
A white snowshoe hare with dark-tipped ears bounds energetically through a snowy landscape, the quiet realm under the watchful eye of a golden eagle. Snow flies as it leaps, while the background is softly blurred with snow-covered trees.

Golden Eagle – Call of the Wild

Nature & Wildlife·1 x 50 min·Completed

In the harsh Alps, a young golden eagle battles for survival after being driven from his territory. This film follows his journey from chick to ruler of the skies.

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Genre
Nature & Wildlife
Duration
1 × 50 min
1 × 90 min
Definition
4K
Audio
5.1
Status
Completed
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Synopsis

In the pale, cold light of dawn, the silhouette of a mighty mountain emerges from a sea of rolling mist. The peak with the cross marking its summit towers majestically over the Alps. From a bird’s-eye perspective, the winter landscape appears like a magnificent painting that lets the observer forget the cold, harsh climate.

Far away in the distance, a tiny dot can be made out soaring among the mountain peaks. A piercing cry that sends a chill to the bone, announces the presence of a young golden eagle even before he has properly come into view. For an instant, the bird seems to hover in the air. The tips of his powerful wings point to the skies as the elegant eagle rides the upwind, gliding ever-nearer. Finally, and almost silently, he lands on a mountain ridge.

The howling wind that sweeps through the mountain peaks drives millions of snow crystals over the ridge of the mountain, powdering the brown and black feathers of the golden eagle white. Far below in the valley lies a seemingly still and peaceful world. But it is not the eagle’s world. A long journey lies behind the young bird. Driven out of his own territory by others of his species, he has come this far and has now reached his limits. Can the world down there in the valley offer him a future? Only one in five young eagles survives its first winter. This film tells his story.

In spring, two eggs belonging to a pair of golden eagles hatch in a nest in a rocky crag in the Alps; first one, then the other. Like most young animals, the two fluffy, white chicks are helpless and completely dependent upon their parents. But already during their first days of life, a power struggle rages between them for superiority and dominance. The parents tend to only feed the eaglet that demands to be fed loudly and most insistently. The older, stronger offspring pecks at its sibling, pushing it away from the food so the younger, weaker chick is often left with nothing.

The two adult golden eagles are also pushed to their limits – having to prove their success as hunters almost every day. Their young are always hungry and constantly demand food. Only in years where there is a plentiful supply of food and the hunters are lucky will both eaglets survive the first few weeks and months. But not in this case: Only one of the young birds survives.

How will he cope in his first winter in the harsh Alpine environment? This is a story full of dramatic twists and turns, in a spectacular, fairy-tale landscape with mountain dwellers that include foxes, marmots, mountain hares, crows, chamois and stags, covering the life of a young golden eagle as he grows from a pushy young bird, who has just learned to fly, to a magnificent king of the skies.

Team

Written and directed by Otmar Penker
Executive producers Andrea Gastgeb, Sabine Holzer
Production companies Produced by Terra Mater Factual Studios
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