Michael Pitiot (born 14 July 1970) is a French screenwriter and film director. He lives and works in France.
Michael Pitiot | |
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Born | Bagneux (city), France | 14 July 1970
Occupation(s) | Film director, screenwriter |
Michael Pitiot shot his first reportages in Zaïre in 1991. He was then recruited as audiovisual attaché at the French embassy in Vietnam, responsible for cooperation with radio and television in Ho Chi Minh City, a position he occupied from 1993 to 1998.
From 1998 to 2000, he travelled back to France aboard a Chinese junk christened Sao Mai and specially built for the journey, with Marielle Laheurte and a team of 30 volunteers from widely differing backgrounds (including the former naval lieutenant Pierre Guillaume, also known as Crabe-Tambour). He produced a documentary for France2 and wrote two accounts of this expedition.
From 2001 to 2003, alongside senior reporter Arnaud de la Grange, he organised a circumnavigation of Africa with 12 well-known writers including Erik Orsenna, Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio and Jean-Christophe Rufin. He also directed a documentary series on this literary and journalistic voyage entitled Portes d’Afrique, for Arte. In 2003, he filmed a road movie through the former Soviet empire in Super8 with Laurent Lepesant that took him to Afghanistan. In 2004 he wrote an account of a voyage to Bhutan to discover its temple carpenter-builders with the illustrator Cloé Fontaine, who later became his wife.
Starting in 2006, he wrote a film script with journalist Daniel Duhand on the forgotten history of the «Poilus d’Alaska» (huskies) in 1915. The same year he joined Tara Expéditions to develop documentaries of its mission. In parallel, in 2009 he published a history of piracy, illustrated by Ségolène Marbach. In 2010, he produced a documentary series in four episodes for France Télévisions on the Tara Oceans mission, co-written with Thierry Ragobert and Frédéric Lossignol and with original music by Gérard Cohen-Tannugi.
Shortly afterwards he met the ecologist and photographer Yann Arthus Bertrand, with whom he co-produced Planet Ocean , [1] a feature-length documentary about man and the ocean. This film, produced thanks to the support of the Omega brand, won the Best Cinematography Award at the Monterey Blue Festival (California, USA). [2] [3] This was the first film produced during a four-year collaboration which also gave birth to three new feature-length documentaries with Yann Arthus-Bertrand: Méditerranée [4] in 2013, which looks at the development of human civilisations in the Mediterranean basin, with the voice of Gérard Darmon and Hiam Abbass ; Algérie, an emotional journey to the heart of Algeria, narrated by Jalil Lespert. The film was aired in France and Algeria the same day in July 2015 ; and TERRA, [5] the sequel of Planet Ocean , a film dedicated to the story of mankind and life, narrated by Vanessa Paradis. Terra was premiered in December 2015 for the COP21 and available worldwide on Netflix by 2016.
In parallel, Michael Pitiot has devoted his time to writing fictional projects. [6]
Yann Arthus-Bertrand is a French environmentalist, activist, journalist and photographer. He has also directed films about the impact of humans on the planet. He is especially well known for his book Earth from Above (1999) and his films Home (2009) and Human (2015). It is because of this commitment that Yann Arthus-Bertrand was designated Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations Environment Programme on Earth Day.
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Earth from Above is a United Nations-supported ecological project conceived and led by Yann Arthus-Bertrand. The project includes a photo essay-style collection of aerial photography produced by Arthus-Bertrand, in which the photographer captured vistas of Earth from various aircraft during a ten-year period. It gave birth to a book also entitled Earth from Above, of which millions of copies were sold.
Christian Baumeister is a German cinematographer and award-winning director focusing on nature and wildlife productions.
Home is a 2009 French documentary film by Yann Arthus-Bertrand. The film is almost entirely composed of aerial shots of various places on Earth. It shows the diversity of life on Earth and how humanity is threatening the ecological balance of the planet. The English version was read by Glenn Close. The Spanish version was read by Salma Hayek. The Arabic version was read by Mahmood Said.
Jon Bowermaster is an oceans expert, journalist, author, filmmaker, adventurer and six-time grantee of the National Geographic Expeditions Council. One of the Society's 'Ocean Heroes,' his first assignment for National Geographic Magazine was documenting a 3,741 mile crossing of Antarctica by dogsled.
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Human is a 2015 documentary by French environmentalist Yann Arthus-Bertrand. The film is almost entirely composed of exclusive aerial footage and first-person stories told into the camera. It was the first film to premiere in the General Assembly Hall of the United Nations, to an audience of 1,000 viewers, including the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.
Planet Ocean, 2012, is a documentary film co-directed by Yann Arthus-Bertrand and Michael Pitiot. The documentary is about the history of the organisms that live in the ocean, and the relationships they have with each other and with humans. The film's cinematographers are Yann Arthus-Bertrand, who is known for his aerial photography, and Michael Pitiot.
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Algeria from above is a 2015 French-Algerian documentary film directed by Yann Arthus-Bertrand and Yazid Tizi. The film showcases the beauty and diversity of Algeria, the largest country in Africa and the Mediterranean, through stunning aerial shots. The film was narrated by Jalil Lespert, a French actor and director of Algerian origin, who addresses his brother who stayed in Algeria and tells him about the country's history, culture, and natural wonders.
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