If you could have one superpower what would it be? Invisibility? Shapeshifting? True genius?
If youāre an octopus those are built-ins. No upgrades necessary. And theyāre all brilliantly exposed in the new Netflix documentary, āMy Octopus Teacher.ā
The film follows South African filmmaker, Craig Foster, as he befriends a female octopus in an Atlantic Ocean kelp forest near his home in 2010.
The friendship comes as heās going through a depression, seeking answers about his life. That quest takes him on the most unusual journey now teaching the world about nature, females, and compassion.
The film has received eight nominations for the Jackson Wild Media Award and recently won Best Feature at the EarthxFilm Festival.
Eight Arms, No Friends
Generally, octopuses are not social creatures, which makes Fosterās relationship all the more compelling.
After weeks of him swimming down to her cave and observing her from a distance, the octopus finally touched Foster with her sucker-covered arms (there are thousands of suckers on octopus arms, similar to fingers).
Curiously she explored Foster and his camera equipment. Sheād eventually accept him and acknowledge his presence. Sheād even swim into his arms and up to the surface with him so he could breathe. Sheād let him tag along on her daily routines of hunting and being hunted herself.
Octopuses are some of the most intelligent creatures of the sea. They can build complex devices for hiding, get creative with acquiring food, outsmart predators ā and, you truly havenāt lived until youāve seen an octopus escape his or her enclosure.
But, cephalopods are also a bit of a paradox ā living fast and dying young, despite their acuity.
Female Octopuses
Female octopuses spend their short lives all alone, until they mate. This usually happens after about a year. A male octopus will pick up her scent. They mate, and she will lay hundreds of thousands of eggs. As in, half a million eggs, all at once.
This stealth and adept solo hunter now has a new purpose: perpetuating the species. And it takes every ounce of energy the octopus has in order to do this. It literally kills her. She canāt give that much of herself and survive.
āLike a devoted hen, sheāll guard her brood, stroking the eggs and occasionally blowing water at them, but she wonāt abandon themānot even for a second,ā George Dvorsky wrote for Gizmodo.
Itās no surprise then that animal rights groups like PETA have been urging people to stop eating octopuses for years.
How Animals Change Us
If Foster had befriended a dog or cat, most people would think nothing of it. Weāre supposed to have friendships with those animals, right? But an octopus?
The eight-limbed, three-hearted, color- and shape-shifting mollusks are about as far from human as it gets.
At one point in the film, Foster refers to her as a liquid predator. Itās accurate; she pours herself through the tiniest cracks and crevices in the hunt for prey. She succeeds where others would be doomed to fail.
You donāt need to be Dr. Doolittle to know what a cat or dog might want to tell you (although, yes please). But what would an octopus say?
And thatās where Foster truly succeeds in āMy Octopus Teacher.ā We canāt stop asking these questions about a creature so foreign and yet so similar.
She is undeniably alive, capable, and curious about her world. We want to know her just as he did.
Foster canāt hide his emotion. Heās tearful throughout the film, especially (spoiler) when discussing her death. He reminisces like heās talking about a person, a relative. And in the most organic of ways, he is doing that.
This is self-awareness, both for Foster as he witnesses his own evolution during the relationship, and the octopusās, as she proves several times in the film that she is aware of her world, her actions, and the activity of her four-limbed friend.
But hereās the thing: her life was nothing extraordinary. It could have been any octopus that Foster stumbled on and befriended. And thatās exactly what makes it so important.
The closer we look at sentience, at her sentience, and the uniqueness of an individual creature, the more it matters.
Foster overcame his depression thanks to his octopus teacherās greatest lesson. āWe as human beings are completely part of nature, we are designed and made wild,ā he told The Daily Mail.
Her impact, although it was only for a short period of his life, has gone on to define him and his lifeās work. Even Fosterās teenage son is now an avid ocean conservationist alongside his dad, eager to learn about and protect the natural world.
Foster was so transformed by the octopus that he created The Sea Change Project, a community working to protect South Africaās kelp forest. āOur goal is to protect South Africaās marine environment by making the Great African Seaforest a global icon,ā the Sea Change Projectās official website says.
āWe are still, just underneath our skin, completely connected to the wild environment. And we are totally reliant on the natural system for every single breath we take, for every mouthful of food we put in our stomachs,ā Foster told the Daily Mail.
āWe are woven of the same thread. Weāre made of the same stuff. If the natural system suffers, we suffer.
āSo itās absolutely critical that if we want to stay on the planet as a species, that we get together and figure out how to regenerate that wild system thatās keeping us alive every second.ā
My Octopus Teacher is currently streaming on Netflix.
Images via Sea Change Project

Jill EttingerĀ is a writer, editor, and business development consultant focused on vegan and sustainable industries. She lives in Los Angeles with her daughter and their two rescue cats.