March of the Penguins
March of the Penguins is a French documentary released in 2005 about the life and death of a flock of Emperor penguins. The documentary follows the penguins to their breeding grounds in Antarctica and watches them as they lay, hatch, and raise their chick
Introduction
I chose to review the movie March of the Penguins because of its great cinematography. The penguins make good subjects as their lives are difficult and unusual, plus they are very cute. The film was directed by Luc Jacquet, who does a great job of using different types of shots to help create a movie that is very entertaining and so much more than just another animal documentary. I chose three pictures that cover different types of shots from a sequence in the movie when the eggs have been laid and the mothers leave them with the fathers and head back to the sea to eat, leaving their mates to protect the eggs. The three most repetitive shots I saw in this film were Extreme Wide shots (EWS), Depth of Field shots, and Extreme Close-Up shots (ECU), and all of these types were used during this section of the film.
Analysis
Shot 1 Shot 2 Shot 3
Shot 1: Extreme close-up shot (ECU)
An Extreme Close-Up shot shows only a part of a character's face, or a very select item. It fills the screen with the details of a subject. In March of the Penguins there is a lot of ECU going on because there is so much drama that the cinematographer is trying to focus on which would be looked over if all the movie shots where at a far distance rather than right up in the action. In the shot below we see a penguin egg which has fallen off the penguins claws as it is moved from the mother to the father and has frozen solid in a matter of seconds. This ECU shot really gives you the idea of how cold it is for this egg to have frozen that fast and it gives you a sense of how sad it is.
Shot 2: Depth of Field:
The Depth of Field is a camera shot that shows the distance between the nearest and furthest points at which the screen image is in reasonably sharp focus. There are many instances in this movie where they use great depth of field shots to show just how far the penguins have to travel from one place to another during their breeding season. In this picture, we see the water close-up and the penguins far off in the distance representing their long journey to find this one small opening in the vast ice shelf which they are living on. The mothers are on their way to open sea to eat, leaving the fathers to stay with the eggs and protect them.
Shot 3: Extreme wide shot (EWS):
An extreme wide shot (EWS) shows a broad view of the surroundings around the character and conveys scale, distance, and geographic location. EWS is used to establish the setting and the surroundings, distance between objects and the character, along with size comparisons. In March of the Penguins, we see a lot less EWS and so when we do see it, it really stands out to the viewer. The cinematographer mostly focuses on a pair of penguins at a time or a small group but the shots rarely cover the whole group. In this picture there are conglomerations of male penguins which are huddling together for warmth trying to keep the eggs safe from the below freezing winds. By using EWS for this image, it gives the viewer the feeling of how vast and empty the landscape is and how small the penguin flock seems in relation to the area. It helps to remind the viewer how harsh the environment is there.
Conclusion:
There is one thing that sets this documentary apart from many others and that is the wide variety of shot types. It is very effective in not only showing the extreme environment but also creating a feeling of drama and emotion. The images make the audience really care about these birds because they convey the penguins’ feelings and make them feel almost human in their struggles. The filmmakers used many defining shots that would normally be used to display drama or action. They also have many ECU shots, which is not common in documentaries. The sequence of the film is chronological but by changing the types of shots, it feels more like a story than just watching the birds for endless hours. In this series of shots, you go from the up close failure of the frozen egg, moving out to the depth of field shot where the female penguins desert the males, and then pulling out wider to show the group of males looking almost like part of the landscape. This use of changing the distance makes the movie more dramatic and interesting.
Rating:
For an animal documentary, I think this one is worth a rating of 10 out of 10.
