March of the Penguins – heart rending

Just finished watching “March of the Penguins“. This is the famous documentary directed by Luc Jacquet that chronicles one entire season of the Emperor Penguin’s lives in one of the harshest places on the planet – Antartica. Morgan Freeman’s excellent narration helps you follow the penguins that march almost 70 miles to their mating and nesting place. Once the mating takes place and the female lays the eggs, the real heart rending part starts. The mother transfers the custody of the egg to the father and marches the same 70 miles to go feed herself and come back with food for the to-be-born chick. Meanwhile, the father faces the harshest winter on the planet to protect the egg. The father goes without food for over 125 days and when the mother returns the father goes on his 70 mile march again to eat and bring food back for the chick. You can see nature’s fury at its worst – the fathers huddling together to keep their bodies warm in the brutal antartic winter leaves you in tears. Survival of the fittest at its brutal best –  Fathers die, mothers die, eggs break, chicks die – of course, several survive – all this in just one season. Why do the penguins suffer this year after year? Do not miss seeing this documentary – it is absolutely riveting. Cinematography is stunning. Flashback: How do the penguins identify their partners and their offspring when they return to the nesting place?

Comments

  1. Anonymous said February 4, 2007, 8:35 am:

    Its the one of best documentary I have ever seen.I watched this movie on cable(on demand),it was so good,I recorded it and shared it with my friends.
    z

  2. Anonymous said February 4, 2007, 8:36 am:

    I forgot to add my name
    -Prasanna

  3. Anonymous said February 4, 2007, 9:21 am:

    Thanks Prasanna. Couldn’t agree more.

  4. Anonymous said February 5, 2007, 9:30 am:

    I saw the French version with subtitle. I was so moved, I watched it twice on the same day. For the first time in nature I have seen father’s nurture the offsping. I had thought it was a exclusive maternal quality. I simply loved the movie.

    -Archana

  5. Anonymous said February 5, 2007, 10:10 pm:

    You should see this fantastic French commercial: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1998759843491683367
    Yep, Movies are most of the times made to be seen. 🙂

  6. Anonymous said February 6, 2007, 9:35 am:

    Thanks Archana. Not just that. The amount of trouble the fathers go through to protect the egg is mind boggling.

  7. Anonymous said February 6, 2007, 9:36 am:

    Good one Kesava. it is indeed a nice emperor penguin commercial.

  8. Anonymous said February 8, 2007, 8:43 am:

    I remembered an interesting fact I read in book on evolution. Whenever a species evolves through a phase of crisis (when it is threatened with complete destruction due to sudden changes in environment etc), the father plays a equally important role in protecting and nurturing the child, simply because there is no other way the baby can survive. The book also concludes that from the behavior of human animals, we too went through a stage of crisis in our evolutionary history, since fathers also play a very important role in nurturing and bringing up the baby.

  9. Anonymous said February 9, 2007, 9:15 am:

    Archana,

    That is very interesting indeed. Do you recall the name of the book?

  10. Anonymous said February 10, 2007, 8:38 pm:

    Yup, Descent of Woman by Elaine Morgan

  11. Anonymous said February 11, 2007, 10:48 pm:

    Thanks Archana. Need to read that one.