National Geographic Documentary Films will produce a documentary on legendary ocean explorer Jacques Cousteau.
Two-time Academy Award-nominated and two-time Emmy-winning director Liz Garbus (“The Farm, Angola USA,” “What Happened, Miss Simone?”) will direct and produce the feature biopic about the world’s most famous ocean explorer, Jacques Cousteau, with Academy Award winner Dan Cogan (“Icarus”) as producer. Academy Award winner Evan Hayes (Free Solo) will also produce under his ACE Content banner.
Cousteau was an inventor, explorer, environmentalist and filmmaker who revolutionized our understanding of the natural world, giving mankind the resources to explore the ocean with the Aqua Lung, the first open-circuit, self-contained underwater breathing apparatus (scuba). An avid conservationist, he also fervently called attention to the consequences of ocean pollution and was a long-time collaborator with the National Geographic Society. He later founded the Cousteau Society, an American nonprofit that produced movies and television series broadcast worldwide. In these, Cousteau took audiences with him on dozens of expeditions, where he guided us below sea level and taught us where to look, how to see and why we must preserve. In 1973, he gave to the Cousteau Society the worldwide, perpetual and exclusive rights to represent his name, likeness and work. The Cousteau Society carries on his missions today all over the planet.
Featuring never-before-seen 4K footage from the Cousteau Society’s archives, Cousteau (wt) will provide audiences a “deep dive” into the renowned explorer’s remarkable life, revealing the man behind some of the world’s most significant contributions to marine conservation. The documentary will begin production this spring and marks the beginning of a first-look deal between National Geographic and the Cousteau Society.
National Geographic Documentary Films last film was “Free Solo,” which won both the Academy Award and the BAFTA for Best Documentary Feature.
