MARCEL ICHAC
DIRECTING
Marcel Ichac, born October 22, 1906 in Rueil-Malmaison (Seine-et-Oise) and died April 9, 1994 in Ézanville (Val-d'Oise), was a French filmmaker, photographer, explorer and mountaineer.
“Grand master of documentaries” according to historian Jean Tulard, Marcel Ichac is considered in particular as “the greatest filmmaker specializing in mountain films in France and undoubtedly in the world” of his generation by Georges Sadoul.
First a skier and mountaineer, a great witness of French mountaineering, Marcel Ichac then became, through the diversity of the spaces explored, the filmmaker of French exploration in the 1930s and 1950s (the first two French expeditions to the Himalayas in 1936 and 1950, scuba diving with Jacques-Yves Cousteau, Greenland with Paul-Émile Victor, the very first speleology documentaries in the world with in particular Norbert Casteret, etc.).
Marcel Ichac revolutionized documentary cinema with his desire to insert the viewer into the action with an obsession with authenticity.
