Luc Jacquet, The March of the Penguins

Luc Jacquet, tall, dark and handsome - the very image of the modern explorer- has a family but he confesses to being under the spell of faraway, isolated places. That is why he was happy to spend nearly a year in Antarctica with a bare bones film crew to chronicle the centuries' old mating habits of the Emperor Penguin. Jacquet's March of the Penguins has become a surprise summer hit, no doubt partly due to the allure of the stately bird itself but also to the amazing intimacy of Jacquet's lens. His cameras effortlessly and unobtrusively capture the arduous life-or-death challenges of these creatures who trek 70 miles from the sea to their breeding grounds where they mate, hatch one egg and then the mother switches it to the father's care who warms it in a pouch between his legs until it hatches. Only then does the mother return from her survival stay back in the Arctic Ocean. All the while these penguins must contend with their predator enemies, sea leopards and petrels. Thrilling, amazing and all true.

•