La marche de l'empereur

I was lucky enough to see this film at the Waterfront Film Festival in Saugatuck, Michigan. This was a wonderful documentary directed by Luc Jacquet which follows penguins traveling to their breeding ground in Antarctica.

Narrated by Morgan Freeman, it's beautiful and I loved the way it didn't just point a camera at penguins and say how they live, this one actually told a story. If it wasn't narrated, you would still be able to follow the basic idea of the film. The countless penguins travel a very long distance to breed. It's very interesting to watch these penguins, they go through so many ordeals just to have kids.

It's in the style of Winged Migration, the scenery is a character. If you get the chance to see this film I recommend it, it's wonderful to look at and it's impossible not to love the penguins.

If you make the effort to catch March of the Penguins, you'll be predictably pleased for the simple fact that if it's penguins you want to see it's penguins you're going to get. Beaucoups de penguins. And you will learn plenty about these noble survivors of the coldest place on earth. If it's Danny DeVito or Burgess Meredith you came to see, you are quite off the mark. The Emperor Penguins of Antarctica survive and perpetuate their species in a frozen and surreal environment driven by instincts developed over centuries. They have mostly monogamous relationships and in the midst of this can recognize one another's 'voices'. These relationships help to organize survival. We get seemingly impossible and privileged views of their long marches across barren landscapes, complex rituals of protecting of fragile eggs in 160 mph winds, huddled in huge packs against the cold, males and females sharing food foraging duties, and chubby birds diving to great depths for fish. It's a remarkable system of survival. The French filmmakers shot on super 16mm film for one year (with 120 hours of images), which is a whole winter cycle for the emperor. They saw none of the images as they progressed. Nobody left until it was done and director as LUC JACQUET SAYS; "It took a year to recover. Re-entry is a long process." The result is, no doubt, some the most remarkable footage ever filmed on the subject. What they do, of course, to reel in their audience is to anthropomorphize these creatures. Like the recent "Parrots of Telegraph Hill" we see the penguins take on the attributes of 'love' and 'caring'. The baby penguins toddle along just like little people, except that they do so braving extreme minus degree temperatures. Miles of these cute birds march across landscapes like little wind up toys in a John Ford snow desert. The story is assisted by cloying music and narration, and the dulcet tones of the ubiquitous Morgan Freeman. But any criticism of the manipulative aspects of the film would be irrelevant in the face of the achievement. These are stunning images beautifully assembled to serve a remarkable story. If your going to get the paying public into a nature flick, this is the way to do it.

The March of the Penguins is a powerful film. It is sad, funny, and simply amazing at the same time. It teaches us that life is a miracle. For the emperor penguins life is an everyday struggle to survive against predators, storms, and raging winds in the harshest weather conditions on earth. The documentary, filmed on location in Antarctica, shows the birds' struggle to eat, live, and reproduce. Each year the birds walk over seventy miles across ice and snow to their breeding ground. There the penguins mate, then conceal their eggs from the cold under a fold of their skin and balancing the precious new life to be born on their claws. Fathers take turns in caring for the eggs until they hatch, while mothers walk long miles again to bring home food for the chicks. Once the chicks are born, the parents work together to feed, shelter, and raise them. French director Luc Jacquet was a scientist before he became a filmmaker. He succeeded in making the story dramatic, compelling, and comprehensible to younger viewers. The film is skillfully narrated by Morgan Freeman. It is a definite MUST SEE.

La Marche de l'Empereur (2005) is a french documentary that features the habits of penguins during the course of one year: their mating rituals, their migrations, laying of the eggs, searching for food, etc. It also shows them facing a danger or two, and (what for me was the highlight of the movie) the moment when the baby penguins break out of their shells! The movie is visually astounding. The cinematographer has managed to capture extreme close-ups where you can see the pattern of their feathers, as well as breath-taking longshots of hundreds of penguins marching on the beautiful icy backdrop. There is also a suspenseful underwater sequence.

The movie is accompanied with poetic voice-overs that tell the story from the penguins' point of view, and gentle ambiance music. There are also a few laughs here and there, as penguins bump into each other or slip on the ice.

The movie could have been handled better from a dramatic storytelling stand-point, but it seemed the director was aiming to create a sort of poetic new age nature movie, and as such, it works perfectly. Admittedly, there are points where the style starts to wear on you, and some parts seem to be repeating themselves, but at 80 minutes long the movie doesn't overstay its welcome.

All in all, the movie is a memorable experience, and manages to be informative and entertaining at the same time, and even manages to be moving on occasion. And penguins are simply the cutest animals!

Despite Luc Jaquet 's brilliant idea of making a documentary on the penguins, people should know that only LAURENT CHALET Director of Photography and assistant JEROME MAISON spent one year shooting the film completely alone and almost died there.

Luc Jaquet, quoted as the Director, was in fact never behind the camera.

Laurent CHALET shot almost 100% of the entire film while Luc Jaquet stayed in France, waiting one year for the return of CHALET and MAISON to start editing the footage that he discovered at the same time.

Laurent CHALET, is the real man behind the Penguins.