Island of Lemurs: Madagascar

Cinephile deep dive

The take

David Douglas directs. David Douglas behind the camera. Mark Mothersbaugh scores. Beth Spiegel cuts. Runs lean at under 100 minutes. Produced in United States of America. Dialogue in English.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

• 1Tight 39-minute runtime — shorter than most television pilots.
• 2Released 12 years ago.
• 3Lean credit list — fewer than 30 people officially credited.
• 4Directed by David Douglas, shot by David Douglas. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
• 5Original score by Mark Mothersbaugh. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.
• 6Editor Beth Spiegel shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
• 7Morgan Freeman and Patricia Wright carry the top of the cast.
• 8Marketing tagline: "A real place you could never imagine. Strange creatures you will never forget.".
• 9IMDB entry: tt3231010 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.
• 10Only 34 TMDB ratings — you're getting ahead of the curve on this one.

The technical file

Cinematography

David Douglas

Original score

Mark Mothersbaugh

Editing

Beth Spiegel

Runtime

39 min · 0h 39m

Aspect ratio (typical)

1.37:1 (Academy)

Status

Released

Box office

$13,842,409

Original language

EN

Certification (US)

G

IMDB

Island of Lemurs: Madagascar (2014) ↗

Also by

David Douglas

• 
  Fires of Kuwait

  1992 · ★ 7.9
• 
  Pandas

  2018 · ★ 7.9
• 
  Straight Up: Helicopters in Action

  2002 · ★ 7.7
• 
  The Rolling Stones: Live at the Max

  1991 · ★ 7.3
• 
  Survival Island

  1996 · ★ 7.0
• 
  Wolves

  1999 · ★ 6.3

Stills · wallpapers

Selected frames

Full-resolution frames — open one to save it as a wallpaper.

Wallpaper

Trailers & featurettes

Watch the pieces

• 

  ▶
  "Island of Lemurs - Madagascar" Trailer - In Theaters 4/4/14

  Trailer
• 

  ▶
  Island of Lemurs: Madagascar - Official Trailer [HD]

  Trailer · Official

Community reviews

What people are saying

• Reno2017-01-15
  ★ 7/10

  The only and final frontier for lemurs is Madagascar. It is a documentary short with a big message. Like an episode of David Attenborough's nature documentary series. I have never seen a live lemur nor I know their character like I do for other animals. So this film was a learning experience for me and I ask you to do the same, if you have zero knowledge about these wonderful creatures. I enjoyed it, but still think they did not use the concept properly. Lacks the depth, I mean going details in scientific research. They have given, but only limited. They have started it by saying how ancient they are and who the reason for the existence of human today. How they found their perfect home in an uninhabited island millions of years ago. Very informative. It was narrated by the actor Morgan Freeman. After the brief introduction, the rest of the film focused to tell an American primatologist's effort to study these animals and educate the local people how precious they are. The pride of Madagascar. I really surprised to learn lots of things, especially about their varieties. But specifying their evolution would have been even better. Since it was a short film, there were restrictions for many things. "Lemurs are Madagascar's living treasure." Once again a film to point out the human's destruction of mother nature. Those who rely on them completely are suffering. Lemurs are the main animal in the Madagascar, but since the humans present from the last two millennia, their numbers are going down. Now Madagascar's the only and final frontier for them. Whatever happened in the past, its time in this third millennium to bring the life back of the old world. Surely every one of us has a small offering that helps to restore it, only we've to commit it right away. So this is a rare documentary. They might have already made a better documentary about the lemurs than this one, but I have never seen them. Since I am a film fanatic, this film came to my notice, but did not take it seriously until now. Mainly because nothing from the poster interested me. I thought it was one of those failed documentary films, with usually tried to impress with the technical aspect like predominated with the digital 3D visuals. I realised now how wrong I was. The poster looks very creepy. I don't think the little kids would want to watch it if they see the film poster first. I thought it was an animation, about the ancient creatures like they do for the dinosaurs. The black lemur with the big blue eyes on the poster looked like an animated character, but he's real. So watch it to educate yourself, particularly if you are a nature and animal lover. Recommended! 7/10

  Read full review ↓

Production companies

Who made it

• 

  IMAX

  CA

Key crew

• ProducerDrew Fellman
• ProducerDiane Roberts
• EditorBeth Spiegel
• Sound EngineerEd Douglas

Themes & keywords

What it's about, really

• madagascar
• animals
• lemur
• nature documentary
• short film
• animal documentary

Release history · US

When it landed

• Theatrical2014-04-03G

Also known as

International titles

• Wildes Madagaskar - Die Insel der LemurenDE
• L'île des lémuriens : MadagascarFR
• Madagascar 3D : L'Ile des LémuriensFR
• L'île des lémuriens : Madagascar 3DCA