March of the Penguins
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
March of the Penguins (French: La Marche de l'empereur; literally The Emperor's March) is a commercially successful French documentary film which won the Academy Award for nature documentary by Luc Jacquet, co-produced by Bonne Pioche and the National Geographic Society.The film depicts the yearly journeys of the emperor penguins of Antarctica. In autumn, all the penguins of breeding age (five years old and over) leave the ocean, their normal habitat, to walk inland to their ancestral breeding grounds. There, the penguins participate in a courtship that, if successful, results in the hatching of a chick. For the chick to survive, both parents must make multiple arduous journeys between the ocean and the breeding grounds over the ensuing months. It took one year to shoot the movie, which was filmed around the French scientific base of Dumont d'Urville in Adélie Land.
This film has been out in the market for sometime now and thanks to the Eid holiday, we finally got the chance to watch it. It is one of the documentary films that you would really appreciate and love. Having watched it somehow challenges your perspective on life itself. It makes you realize how precious and fragile life is.
Before, I only knew that penguins are birds that cannot fly but are good swimmers and they live in the very region of the Antarctica. Now I do not only know them for the funny way they walk. I now have great respect and admiration for these creatures. I never thought that animals are capable of such great sacrifice; courage and perseverance to overcome obstacles and very difficult situations; cooperation and unity. It is funny how a film about animal like this one can have so much impact on one’s view of the world. I guess, one must see the film to have a full grasp of the things that I am trying to say. For those who have seen the film and share the same sentiment as I do, I salute you! For those who haven’t, I hope that you take the time to see the film and somehow, it will have the same effect on you as it did on me. Viva March of the Penguins!
