The White Planet-La Planete blanche (2006)

Directed by: Thierry Piantanida, Thierry Ragobert | 86 minutes | documentary

‘The White Planet’ begins with a spectacular overview of the frozen white Arctic. Secluded and deserted from everything and everyone, the polar wind that has free play and uses the thin snow as a toy. When looking at these images you experience the horrible cold of this continent. A mother polar bear has dug a den where she will stay for the next 100 days. Her young will be born and emerge at the beginning of spring. ‘The White Planet’ tells the story of four seasons of the Arctic. Of the immeasurable nature and its inhabitants. From the caribou, rabbits, guinea pig, foxes and birds, but also from the seals, sea lions, humpback whales and the narwhal, a particularly dressed whale. The film is not limited to one animal species that survives the harsh cold of the Arctic, but almost the entire flora and fauna is shown. French filmmakers Thierry Ragobert and Thierry Piantanida already have a number of documentaries to their name, mainly intended for themed channels such as Discovery. The commentary for this film is provided by the man who was the first to reach the North Pole on foot: Jean Louis Etienne.

It is an imposing army of caribou that make their annual migration. The images are beautifully constructed by the directors by starting with a small group after which they amaze you with the amount of caribou that undertake the journey. Also worth mentioning is the plankton-hunting Icelandic whale that risks its life swimming through the drifting ice. They are images that yield a lot of oh’s and ah’s.

‘The White Planet’ has many beautiful images. Etienne’s comment is on the brief side, but because he can tell his own experiences it is special. And while life in the North Pole can be deadly, death is rare in the movie. No snapping bears, no seals bitten to death. It all remains sweet and mysterious what happens there.Mysterious is also the music of Bruno Coulais, who occasionally makes a statement. Where silence is required, Coulais comes out from behind the image with an exuberant song. This is the only dissonance about this movie.

‘The White Planet’ also tells the story of the beauty the North Pole is home to and it is therefore remarkable that only at the end of the film is it just as quickly told that the pack ice, the habitat of, for example, the polar bears, will be at the end of the 21st century. will have completely disappeared. The result of the greenhouse effect. Only then does the finger come to point out our fate to us people. ‘The White Planet’ has become a nice document. Beautiful to look at, with beautiful images of beautiful nature and special flora and fauna. At 86 minutes, the documentary is long enough not to get boring.