Awakenings: March of the Penguins

Tuesday, July 22, 2014

March of the Penguins

This Day in History: July 22, 2005

There are movies that make us roll with laughter until our sides hurt, cry what seems like buckets of tears leaving both eyes looking like Georgia road maps, wish we had never bought the movie tickets because they were a waste of money, or wait in anticipation until released on DVD in order to relive the emotion over and over and over again. Then, there are movies so uplifting we watch them totally in awe. These are often documentaries...real life, not acting because most of the time they are Uplifting Animal Movies.

Such is the case on this day in 2005 with the release of the movie, March of the Penguins: A documentary film on the Emperor Penguins in Antarctica.

Film 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. Narrated by Morgan Freeman.

On March 5, 2006, March of the Penguins won an Oscar for Best Documentary Feature. The success of March of the Penguins appeared to spark a mini-penguin craze: In November 2006, Happy Feet, a computer-animated film about emperor penguins, opened in U.S. theaters. Happy Feet won an Oscar for Best Animated Feature at the 79th Academy Awards on February 25, 2007.