Growing up, I remember watching nature shows of British naturalist Sir David Attenborough, exploring remote regions of Africa and the world. Also popular at the time was the Born Free film and TV series, about an orphaned lion cub hand-raised in Meru by naturalist Joy Adamson.
Hundreds of nature documentaries and TV series have come out of Kenya and Africa over the decades, but most have never been seen by locals. The influence of these films has not been on Africans but westerners, enlightening them about the natural world and stimulating a desire to protect African wildlife. They have also contributed to the perception of the ‘white saviour’ when it comes to African conservation matters.
“These films were not made for our audiences. They don’t relate to us, they are not in our languages, or narrated by people we can relate to,” says Dr Paula Kahumbu, CEO of the conservation NGO WildlifeDirect that produces the nature TV series, Wildlife Warriors.
These films were not made for our audiences. They don’t relate to us, they are not in our languages, or narrated by people we can relate to
The trend continues even today. In 2019 came the award-winning documentary Kifaru, about the world’s last male white rhino living in Ol Pejeta Conservancy and his Kenyan caretakers. Directed by American David Hambridge, it has been screened multiple times overseas but never seen in Kenya, apart from private viewing at a fundraising auction in Nairobi.
The Ivory Game of 2016, an investigative documentary film about the illegal ivory trade, and executively produced by Hollywood actor Leonardo DiCaprio, was shot in East Africa but is available only on Netflix.
In 2018, I was fortunate enough to attend a private viewing of The Elephant Queen, another hugely acclaimed movie, about an elephant herd in Kenya. The movie is on Apple TV+, an online platform not accessible in Kenya, and has only once been shown on local TV. Yet filmmakers Mark Deeble and Victoria Stone have lived in East Africa for more than 30 years.
There is evidence that well-told African films can stimulate positive action. There was a notable rise in tourism interest to Kenya following the release of the Out of Africa, the 1985 movie which made the world ‘fall in love with Africa’. The hugely popular BBC nature documentary Big Cat Week, filmed in Kenya starting in 1996, became known as the ‘original wildlife soap opera’.
This long-running series was a gamechanger for wildlife diary filming around the world because of the way that the mostly White narrators personalised the individual lion, leopard and cheetah stars of the show. Big Cat has never been screened locally. “We also haven’t used wildlife filmmaking as a tool for furthering our environmental needs,” says Kahumbu.
For Africans to take action on wildlife, conservation and social justice, they need to find these stories relatable to them. That is why we need more Africans telling African stories
WHY THEY’RE INACCESSIBLE
The challenge of accessing African-based films lies in the value chain. By the time movie directors come to film in Kenya or some other African country, they have been commissioned abroad, signed a contract and secured financial backing. It is very hard for anybody else to enter into a sealed deal.
The moviemakers shoot locally, release overseas and win awards that enhance their careers. The films get bought by international distribution companies that then control public viewing rights. A local TV company must pay hefty fees to show it here.
Furthermore, in more than 50 years of active wildlife documentaries, hardly any Africans have been trained to film and produce nature stories. International filmmakers come with their own directors, crew and equipment and take them away along with the footage. And like the famous wildlife movies of old, “the people at the frontline telling the story today tend not to be people of colour,” Kahumbu says. She adds that it is disempowering to African audiences when their narrative about their natural heritage and their role in it is missing.
Jubilian Ngarua is a documentary filmmaker from Nigeria and a National Geographic Explorer, who makes stories that are deeply rooted in cultural contexts. She said, “The authenticity of [African] stories gets tampered with when they are not being told by indigenous people. For Africans to take action on wildlife, conservation and social justice, they need to find these stories relatable to them, especially by those telling these stories. That is why we need more Africans telling African stories.”
Ngarua gave me the example of the Netflix documentary, My Octopus Teacher, about South African filmmaker Craig Foster, who forms a relationship with an octopus in the ocean near his house. My Octopus Teacher won several international awards, including an Oscar in 2021. “It is indeed mind-blowing. Craig Foster is an amazing storyteller, and I can't wait to create something as amazing as that.”
CHANGING THE NARRATIVE
Ngarua is helping to organise a free virtual conference October called “Africans at the Heart of Wildlife Filmmaking – How we can make it happen”. This will be in conjunction with National Geographic, WildlifeDirect, Mpala Research Centre and the NEWF film organisation from South Africa.
The objective of this open discussion is to bring together different stakeholders interested in elevating African wildlife filmmaking for the purpose of conservation and to address serious environmental issues.
“Africans have forgotten that the environment and animals have rights, too,” Ngarua says. “Our ancestors had a very good relationship with the environment, of co-existence rather than dominance. Animals were venerated and seen as sacred way before the colonisers came to Africa. Now there is no respect for anything that isn't human, and this is destroying our world.”
The solution to the missing African voices in wildlife filming and storytelling lies with Africans. Foreign filmmakers have little interest in changing the current model as it works in their favour.
Kahumbu is trained as an ecologist and conservationist, but she landed into filmmaking quite by accident. Her organisation, WildlifeDirect, was the first Kenyan entity to successfully produce nature television shows with the weekly series, NTV Wild and NTV Wild Talk, in 2016.
Kahumbu says they went into filmmaking because they wanted to tell the conservation story from a Kenyan perspective and to highlight the many highly trained, local scientists in the field. Despite scepticism by media executives, the initial TV shows garnered around 4 million viewers each week, discrediting the idea that Kenyans are not interested in nature television.
After NTV Wild came the TV series Wildlife Warriors in 2019 on Citizen TV. The show has reviewed a range of issues and Kenyan experts, including turtle conservationists, rhino keepers, whales watchers, snake experts, female elephant ecologists in Amboseli, and researcher Ambrose Letoluai who, in 2019, documented rare black leopards in Laikipia, although global recognition later went to a British photographer.
The Samburu Warriors episode, highlighting lion conservation and community advocacy by young Samburu warriors in Westgate Conservancy, won Special Jury Recognition in the category Global Voices at the 2021 Jackson Wild film festival. The prestigious Jackson Wild is said to be the Oscars of media awards.
Persistent lobbying over the years by African conservationists to the western filmmaking industry is beginning to bear fruit. In 2020, Jackson Wild sponsored a virtual mentorship summit for Kenyan filmmakers to be tutored by global movie specialists. Kenyan marine biologist, Juliet Karisa, was among 10 African women who recently completed a three-month course in underwater filmmaking and storytelling in South Africa. The course was hosted by NEWF (Nature, Environment and Wildlife Filmmakers) and National Geographic.
Beyond a dearth of local wildlife filmmakers, a whole ecosystem needs to be nurtured in Kenya; otherwise, film producers will have nowhere to plug in their talent. As Kahumbu says, we need to bring on board local scientists, wildlife experts, environmental journalists, universities both local and international, movie distributors, media houses, and the global companies that manufacture specialised wildlife filming equipment.
Edited by T Jalio
