On a cold winter night in early February 2023, New Yorkers were captivated by the curious sudden appearance of a large owl, seemingly quite out of its element, found loitering on a Fifth Avenue sidewalk in Midtown.
After much confusion and excitement, and a failed attempt that evening at capturing this mysterious owl, fascinating news soon revealed the eccentric bird to be Flaco, a male Eurasian eagle-owl who had lived nearly his entire 12-year life in the Central Park Zoo. Further details so incredible that they feel as if pulled out of a children’s book or Pixar movie, revealed that Flaco had escaped from the zoo after some unknown person(s) cut a hole in his enclosure.
Filmmaker Penny Lane depicts the ensuing year-long New York adventures of Flaco in her wonderful documentary Wild Inside. Sitting down with me recently, Lane recounted how she became aware of Flaco on that fateful first night, after receiving some extraordinary photos from a friend who just happened to stumble upon the wayward bird in Midtown Manhattan.
"He sent them to me because I was a birder," Lane said, about receiving the early photos of Flaco. "And so he was like 'hey look, an owl!' ...and I was like, oh no, that owl needs help... you know, and I became involved, because I was calling the police and the Wild Bird Fund, to try to get him rescued."
"And all these details are coming to light - someone broke into the zoo, what?! Oh it's a zoo escape?" Lane recalls. "And then the zoo's trying to catch him, but they can't... so I was losing sleep over this owl right away. As were many people."
Lane explains that the idea to make her documentary following Flaco was sparked by the realization that many dedicated wildlife photographers and wildlife enthusiasts were already capturing high-quality footage and photos of Flaco.
"...it didn't turn into a movie idea until I came to see that there was this group of wildlife photographers who were producing high quality, great images of Flaco, and that he already had a camera crew following him around. And so I always conceived of the film as being - not entirely, but largely crowdsourced. And the film could never have been made if there hadn't been this group of people who were so devoted to Flaco and devoted to documenting his life."
Lane told me how just beneath the charming, whimsical surface-layer of Flaco’s story, there was always a darker inevitability, especially to those familiar with the many hazards constantly threatening birds of prey in New York City.
"There's a lot of humor, there's a lot of beauty, and awe, and inspiration in the story... but ultimately it is a tragic story, because, you know he was... in some senses, doomed," Lane solemnly remarks.
"...there are irresolvable problems and questions at the heart of the story... with Flaco, obviously it was hard to deny that he was able to be an owl in a way that he'd never been an owl in the past. It was beautiful. At the same time, anyone who was really tapped-in was aware that even if he had succeeded in kind of adapting, which I think he did... even if he did that, sadly wild owls have it pretty rough in New York." Lane says.
"...we've filled the landscape with poison, and we've surrounded them with dangers of all kinds. And so, it was painful and fascinating, I would say, to hold these contradictory beliefs."
Be sure to check out the film to see exactly where Flaco's journey led - but Penny Lane also stresses the importance of continuing to be actively conscious of the wildlife around us in places like big cities.
"We ended up licensing material from about 100 people, and we offered them the possibility that they could donate the licensing fees to the Wild Bird Fund, and so we ended up raising over $21,000 together in this way, which really just shows how much these photographers care about wildlife in New York City."
"All the people you met in my film who were taking pictures of Flaco, are today taking a photo somewhere else in New York City, of another animal. They really care about wildlife, and they want to educate the public, and they're out there right now filming a coyote or a turkey or any number of other creatures that they want you to care about."
Wild Inside is playing now in theaters across the US. Find a showing near you at flacodocumentary.com
The film will be shown this Saturday 9/19 at the Museum of the Moving Image
...and support our fellow feathered-New-Yorkers like Flaco at wildbirdfund.org
