"La marche de l'empereur" reste en lice pour l'Oscar du meilleur documentaire, a annoncé mardi l'Académie des arts et des sciences du cinéma à Hollywood (Californie, ouest) dans un communiqué.

Le film de Luc Jacquet sur la vie des manchots empereur dans l'Antarctique fait partie des 15 demi-finalistes choisis par l'Académie parmi 82 candidats. Les noms des cinq finalistes nommés pour l'Oscar seront connus le 31 janvier prochain, comme pour les 24 autres catégories de récompenses.

Parmi les autres films toujours en compétition figurent "Enron: the smartest guys in the room" sur la faillite du géant américain de l'énergie en 2001 et "Murderball" racontant la marche vers la gloire de sportifs paraplégiques, déjà lauréat du prix du meilleur documentaire au festival de Sundance.

D'autres documentaires abordant des sujet de société américains, comme "Mad hot ballroom", l'histoire d'enfants d'écoles de New York apprenant à danser, ou "After innocence" sur la réinsertion de prisonniers blanchis par l'ADN après des années d'incarcération, ont également été sélectionnés.

"La marche de l'empereur" est devenu le plus gros succès français de tous les temps sur le marché nord-américain, où il a recueilli plus de 76 millions de dollars de recettes depuis fin juin.

C'est un autre film, "Joyeux Noël" de Christian Carion, qui a été choisi par la France pour concourir à l'Oscar du meilleur film étranger.

La 78e cérémonie des Oscars se déroulera le 5 mars 2006 au théâtre Kodak de Hollywood, au nord-ouest de Los Angeles.

Le Monde.

The march of the penguins / la marche de l'empreur

a great documentary, an extrem shooting, a life story...

The march of the penguins takes place in the iced-sea, relating the travel of birds colonies walking trough it for days to birthchild in a save place...waiting for spring...

The pictures are amazing! and the story related is surprising...

The only thing, element wich is regreted : the voices!

why ? It's ok the first time you see it to better understand what's going on, but then, it's just stupid... sound like a disney picture, where animals have human attributes, feelings and philosophy... a regular, deep and good voice over, narrator would be a undred time better...to inform, giving elements of the different marchs... but with actors, playing frozen birds...we just can imagine the christmas commercial issue of the film... only check the US trailer...i just laugh (the french one is different...and did had a true heavy "kid traget")

anyway...you can put the voices off, to enjoy fully nature' show !

DIRECTOR'S STATEMENT

With short steps, bent under the pitiless burden of a driving snowstorm, the emperor penguin labours through a vast labyrinth of ice. Around him, all is white, all is in violent flux. Yet the valiant bird never falters, undaunted by seemingly insurmountable obstacles. He keeps going. In this land where no other creature ventures, the emperor continues on to his romantic rendezvous. As it follows the winter migration of the emperor penguin, "March of the Penguins" tells a tale of legendary proportions, portraying the strange, spectacular destiny of powerful and emotionally-involving characters, rich in courage and humour, mystery and manifest drama.

My goal is to dig from the ice a story which has never seen the light of day for want of a teller. A true story, however extraordinary. A story repeated every winter, as it has been for hundreds of thousands of years. But there has never been a generation of men to witness and shape it, to pass it down, for man has never colonized the Antarctic. The emperor penguin had never encountered man before the first polar explorers arrived barely a century ago. In 1950, when tentative, makeshift bases were established here, scientific observation had replaced legend as Man's preferred narrative.

The emperor penguin and man have not lived together long enough for folktales or myths to develop. They remain strangers, crossing on rare occasions in the vast desert expanses of the Antarctic.

With this in mind, my desire is to tell a real story: through the extraordinary images of the emperor penguin during the austral winter, images that have always fascinated me; and with words worthy of both the Antarctic's excessive nature, and the emperor's epic destiny. It is time for the emperor's legend to be told.

LUC JACQUET

REVIEW SUMMARY

It's impossible to watch the thousands of emperor penguins huddled together against the icy Antarctic blasts in Luc Jacquet's documentary film without feeling a tug of anthropomorphic kinship. Never mind that emperor penguins have been doing this for millenniums and that this is their way. The feeling that these creatures are brave, indomitable souls surviving unimaginable physical hardship for the sake of their families is inescapable. This sentimental but riveting film has no qualms about playing on our emotions. One teaser ad announces, "In the harshest place on earth, love finds a way," over a picture of a mature penguin gracefully bending down to feed one of its open-mouthed young from its beak. Although "March of the Penguins" stops mercifully short of trying to make us identify with the hardships overcome by a single penguin family, it conveys an intimate sense of the life of the emperor penguin.

Stephen Holden, The New York Times

MARCH OF THE PENGUINS

Synopsis :

 In the Antarctic, every March since the beginning of time, the quest begins to find the perfect mate and start a family. This courtship will begin with a long journey – a journey that will take them hundreds of miles across the continent by foot, in freezing cold temperatures, in brittle, icy winds and through deep, treacherous waters. They will risk starvation and attack by dangerous predators, under the harshest conditions on earth, all to find true love.

Directed by: Luc Jacquet As told by: Morgan Freeman Cast: Introducing the Emperor Penguins This film is rated G. Scheduled to open: June 24, 2005