Highly acclaimed wildlife film, Saving Rhino Phila, has been nominated as a finalist in the Best Conservation Program category at the esteemed Jackson Hole Wildlife Film Festival (JHWFF) in Wyoming in the USA.
The JHWFF is internationally recognised as the premier event of its genre and is an industry gathering of more than 600 broadcast and media stakeholders, writers, prominent scientists and conservationists.
With more than 540 films entered around the world, the festival runs from 23 to 27 September.
Saving Rhino Phila, which was produced by Johannesburg-based production company Triosphere for the Natural History Unit (NHU) Africa, won the ROSCAR Award for Best Environmental Production at WildTalk Africa this year and also the 2012 Panda Award for Best Film in the Nature Conservancy Environment and Conservation category.
NHU Africa describes Saving Rhino Phila as: “From deep within a conflict emerges a powerful emotional story of survival. A new breed of poachers has recently gone to war on South Africa’s rhino population and against all odds one rhino has survived their bullets. Her name is Phila.
“Phila’s story lures us into a world of organised crime and millionaire poachers, armed to the teeth with automatic weapons, helicopters and night vision goggles.
“A host of offbeat characters are drawn into Phila’s world: from her owner and his shattered dreams to wildlife veterinarians arrested for poaching. From crack police units to glamorous landowners lacing their rhinos’ horns with poison.
“It’s a rollercoaster ride complete with surprising twists in a conflict that is not as simple as it seems on the surface. And Phila has inadvertently become the symbol of hope in this war where the survival of her species is literally at stake.’
Saving Rhino Phila was directed by Richard Slater-Jones and co-produced by Oloff Bergh and Kira Ivanoff. The movie was edited by Katherine Pienaar and Michael Cleary was in charge of cinematography.
According to the latest statistics, 446 rhinos have been poached in South Africa this year.
