His name is inscribed at the very top of the history of navigation. Magellan, the ambitious explorer who launched the first circumnavigation by boat, is the subject of a documentary series presented on TV5 which ingeniously combines live action and animation.
Posted at 11:00 a.m.
To embark on a maritime exploration in the era of “great discoveries” was to embark on the unknown. Christopher Columbus was looking west for the route to India when he ran into America. The map of the known world expanded over the course of the expeditions and the appetite of the European crowns to dominate it grew at the same rate.
The extraordinary journey of Magellan plunges back into this fascinating era, which marked the world and whose traces still remain today.
From these explorations have indeed flowed colonization movements that have redrawn the map of the world and the slave trade on a large scale.
Separated into four episodes, the series first dwells on the life of Magellan and the context in which he develops his plan to find, in the south of newly discovered Brazil, a route that would lead him to the Moluccas, an archipelago that today forms part of Indonesia, where there was a rare spice, the clove.
IMAGE FROM THE SERIES THE EXTRAORDINARY JOURNEY OF MAGELLANPROVIDED BY TV5
The documentary series emphasizes this without dwelling too much on it: the spice trade was one of the main drivers of these daring explorations. These aromatics occupied a special place in the economy and could be used as currency, a practice that would be the origin of the expression “pay in cash”.
A perilous business
The historical framework planted, the series focuses on the figure of Magellan. She paints the portrait of a dedicated soldier and a seasoned navigator who will be disappointed by the lack of recognition that the Portuguese sovereign shows him for the services he has rendered. This prompted him to propose to the neighboring crown, Spain, to take possession in his name of the famous archipelago of the Moluccas.
Magellan will weigh anchor in April 1519 at the head of a fleet of five ships and about 240 sailors, and the voyage which will be told is based on the chronicle of one of the men on board, the Italian Antonio Pigafetta. Already perilous on paper, his expedition quickly became threatening: the Spanish captains fomented a mutiny even before the boats passed the mouth of the Guadalquivir, which overlooks the Atlantic.
The slow, but very intriguing story, skilfully juggles between the two fronts on which Magellan must fight: on the one hand, he must face the raging seas and sink into the unknown, and on the other hand, face to the dissidence of some of its crews.
The narration sets an epic yet solemn tone to the documentary and to the exploits performed by the sailors, only about 30 of whom will survive the expedition. Magellan himself, who died in the Philippines, will not see the end of it.
IMAGE FROM THE SERIES THE EXTRAORDINARY JOURNEY OF MAGELLANPROVIDED BY TV5
The extraordinary journey of Magellan relies on “talking heads” who contribute to giving all the excess of the expedition in progress, the qualities of navigators required to carry it out and bring the historical elements necessary to fully understand the behind-the-scenes games.
However, the series stands out in particular for an aesthetic trick: the ingenious use of animated sequences to reproduce what should be called “period scenes”. This reliance on drawing not only brings Magellan and the storms he faces to life, it also gives momentum to an otherwise classic series in form, despite its fascinating subject matter.
From Monday, 8 p.m., at TV5