''Becoming Cousteau'' is a 2021 American

documentary film A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional film, motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". Bill Nichols (film critic), Bil ...

directed and produced by

Liz Garbus Elizabeth Freya Garbus (born April 11, 1970) is an American documentary film director and producer. Notable documentaries Garbus has made are ''The Farm: Angola, USA,'' ''Ghosts of Abu Ghraib,'' ''Bobby Fischer Against the World,'' ''Love, Marily ...

. It follows the life and career of

Jacques Cousteau Jacques-Yves Cousteau, (, also , ; 11 June 191025 June 1997) was a French naval officer, oceanographer, filmmaker and author. He co-invented the first successful Aqua-Lung, open-circuit SCUBA (self-contained underwater breathing apparatus). T ...

. It premiered at the

Telluride Film Festival The Telluride Film Festival (TFF) is a film festival held annually in Telluride, Colorado during Labor Day weekend (the first Monday in September). The 49th edition took place on September 2 -6, 2022. History First held on 30 August 1974, th ...

on September 2, 2021, and was released on October 22, 2021, by Picturehouse.

Synopsis

The film follows the life and career of

, who tried to warn the world for decades about

climate change In common usage, climate change describes global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its effects on Earth's climate system. Climate change in a broader sense also includes previous long-term changes to E ...

Production

In 2015, National Geographic Documentary Films approached

about directing a documentary film revolving around

, and she agreed. Over the course of five years, Garbus worked with The Cousteau Society to get access to unseen footage. In May 2019, it was announced Garbus would direct a documentary film revolving around Cousteau, with Cousteau Society Archives producing and with National Geographic Documentary Films set to produce.

Release

It had its world premiere at the

48th Telluride Film Festival The 48th Telluride Film Festival took place on September 2–6, 2021 in Telluride, Colorado, United States. After the cancellation of the previous year's event due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Colorado, the festival required proof of vaccination ...

on September 2, 2021. It had its international premiere at the

Toronto International Film Festival The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF, often stylized as tiff) is one of the largest publicly attended film festivals in the world, attracting over 480,000 people annually. Since its founding in 1976, TIFF has grown to become a permane ...

on September 10, 2021. It was released on October 22, 2021, by Picturehouse.

Reception

Critical reception

''Becoming Costeau'' holds a 98% approval rating on

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

website

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

, based on 54 reviews, with a

weighted average The weighted arithmetic mean is similar to an ordinary arithmetic mean (the most common type of average), except that instead of each of the data points contributing equally to the final average, some data points contribute more than others. The ...

of 7.40/10. On

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

, the film holds a rating of 74 out of 100, based on 16 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".

Accolades

References

External links

* * * {{National Geographic Documentary Films 2021 films 2021 documentary films American documentary films National Geographic Society films Films directed by Liz Garbus 2020s American films Jacques Cousteau