JACQUES-YVES COUSTEAU EARLY SCUBA DIVING FILM "TEN FATHOMS DEEP" 20172

This novelty film "Ten Fathoms Deep" shows Jacques-Yves Cousteau and his revolutionary SCUBA equipment. Shot in the earliest era of Cousteau's explorations of the undersea world, this film hints at what Cousteau would accomplish in the depths in the post-WWII world.
Jacques-Yves Cousteau AC (French: [ʒak iv kusto]; commonly known in English as Jacques Cousteau; 11 June 1910 - 25 June 1997) was a French naval officer, explorer, conservationist, filmmaker, innovator, scientist, photographer, author and researcher who studied the sea and all forms of life in water. He co-developed the Aqua-Lung, pioneered marine conservation and was a member of the Académie française.
Cousteau described his underwater world research in series of books, perhaps most successful being his first book, The Silent World: A Story of Undersea Discovery and Adventure, published in 1953. Cousteau also directed films, most notably the documentary adaptation of the book, The Silent World, which won a Palme d'or at the 1956 Cannes Film Festival. He remained the only person to win a Palme d'Or for a documentary film, until Michael Moore won the award in 2004 for Fahrenheit 9/11.
The years of World War II were decisive for the history of diving. After the armistice of 1940, the family of Simone and Jacques-Yves Cousteau took refuge in Megève, where he became a friend of the Ichac family who also lived there. Jacques-Yves Cousteau and Marcel Ichac shared the same desire to reveal to the general public unknown and inaccessible places - for Cousteau the underwater world and for Ichac the high mountains. The two neighbors took the first ex-aequo prize of the Congress of Documentary Film in 1943, for the first French underwater film: Par dix-huit mètres de fond (18 meters deep), made without breathing apparatus the previous year in the Embiez islands (Var) with Philippe Tailliez and Frédéric Dumas, using a depth-pressure-proof camera case developed by mechanical engineer Léon Vèche (engineer of Arts and Métiers and the Naval College).
In 1943, they made the film Épaves (Shipwrecks), in which they used two of the very first Aqua-Lung prototypes.
During the 1940s, Cousteau is credited with improving the aqua-lung design which gave birth to the open-circuit scuba technology used today. According to his first book, The Silent World: A Story of Undersea Discovery and Adventure (1953), Cousteau started diving with Fernez goggles in 1936, and in 1939 used the self-contained underwater breathing apparatus invented in 1926 by Commander Yves le Prieur. Cousteau was not satisfied with the length of time he could spend underwater with the Le Prieur apparatus so he improved it to extend underwater duration by adding a demand regulator, invented in 1942 by Émile Gagnan. In 1943 Cousteau tried out the first prototype aqua-lung which finally made extended underwater exploration possible.
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This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD and 2k. For more information visit www.PeriscopeFilm.com

[@ScotHacker]

This weekend I found an original super-8 copy of this film in a box of my father's old photos. I don't have a projector, so typed the film title into YT and was thrilled to stumble on this perfectly digitized version. Thanks so much for posting this!

[@klimfilm]

Спасибо. Погружение в киноисторию!

[@seikibrian8641]

This was Jacques-Yves Cousteau's first underwater film, from 1943; originally in French and titled Par dix-huit mètres de fond.

[@PeriscopeFilm]

Actually, "Par dix-huit metres de fond" is similar but not identical to this film. The two films share common footage but this one was made post-war by Eugene Castle and includes a new opening tease. You can see the original film at vimeo.com/72055098

[@seikibrian8641]

I stand corrected. In viewing Par dix-huit mètres de fond at the link you provided I also see that it was about skin diving, AKA snorkeling. The scuba footage in Ten Fathoms Deep is from the 1946 Cousteau film Epaves (Wrecks). Interesting that 10 fathoms equals 18 meters, so the English title of the scuba film equals the French title of the snorkeling film. No wonder I was confused.

[@christopherwilson122]

marvolous

[@garyflowers8372]

Well, nowadays they make it seem like scuba diving is do easy but with all of these instruments that you have the out in and wear I don't think that it's as simple as they make it sound and furthermore I think that if you are going to learn thst you need to get as much instruction ad you can abd have s good dive buddy and have a few fellow enthusiasts scuba divers along too if you go on a dive or to an exotic location because if something happens your dive buddy may panic and I think that it would be best to have some extra help along to ease the pressure on the five buddy so that he won't be pressured or stressed trying to get help for his dive buddy or partner!

[@deaddog5344]

You can tell Jacques-Yves Cousteau was just learning to dive because he was rising faster than the little bubbles from his regulator. We know this is a no, no today.

[@garymattscheck9066]

Jack Gusto!😂