Feb 21, 2011…Breaking news from the box offices… “The Last Lions” debuts taking $68,344 on four screens! “The Last Lions” are roaring across the country with great reviews! Congratulations to the filmmakers Dereck and Beverly Joubert.
Click this link and 10 cents goes to The Last Lions: http://www.treehugger.com/files/2011/02/the-last-lions-film-review-five-years-to-save-the-wild-african-population.php
Manohla Dargis writes in The New York Times (Feb 18th) film review:
“One of the most urgent and certainly among the most beautifully shot documentaries to hit the big screen in recent memory, “The Last Lions” isn’t just another cute and fuzzy encounter session with a different species. It’s a pulse -quickening, tear-duct milking and outrageously dramatized story about the threats – wild-fires, chomping teeth, stampeding hooves and, worst of all, unseen humans – that face a female lion trying to protect her cubs”.
FROM NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC:
Fifty years ago there were as many as 450,000 lions in Africa. Today there are as few as 20,000. When acclaimed natural history filmmakers and passionate conservationists Dereck and Beverly Joubert started sounding the alarm about these dwindling populations, National Geographic listened. The Last Lions is Dereck and Beverly Joubert’s new theatrical documentary from National Geographic Entertainment that follows the life of an ostracized lioness and her cubs as they fight to survive raging wildfires, marauding male lions, and a competitive pride of lionesses. Their only defense is to escape to Duba Island, a tiny enclave in Botswana’s Okavango Delta.
The film was shot entirely on location, with Dereck filming and directing, and Beverly producing and capturing sound. Dereck wrote the narrative, and Beverly shot still photos that are featured in their accompanying book, The Last Lions (available at www.shopng.com).
Dereck and Beverly Joubert are a force of nature themselves; they have been filming, researching, and exploring in Africa for more than 25 years. Their coverage of predator behavior has resulted in 20 films, 6 books, and several articles for National Geographic magazine. They are pioneers in the field of wildlife filmmaking, and are National Geographic Explorers-in-Residence.
Take advantage of the many ways to tell your friends about this important film and the underlying call to action to support big cat conservation. There are a number of ways you can support the film. Here is a summary:
- On March 1 at 6 p.m. EST, the Jouberts will host an hour-long segment on the shopping channel ShopNBC to talk about big cats. 100 percent of the net proceeds from the sale of their books, prints, and Cause an Uproar apparel on ShopNBC will benefit the Big Cats Initiative. You will also be able to watch this segment online, live, or recorded, on the ShopNBC website.
- The film’s website, thelastlions.com, has links to the Cause an Uproar site, as well as theater listings and a wealth of information about the film and the filmmakers.
- Film trailer donation program: Go to YouTube to watch the film’s trailer. For every view, National Geographic is donating $0.10 toward big cat conservation in Botswana.
- Sweepstakes: Botswana Tourism and National Geographic Expeditions have teamed up on a sweepstakes offer for a trip for two to Botswana. Enter here.
- Mobile App (http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/the-last-lions/id417180618?mt=8): Take an Urban Safari with your friends and family! Take photos of yourself and others smack dab in the middle of a variety of scenes from the movie, then share via email or Facebook. See some sample photos from our Nat Geo Movies’ staff on the film’s Facebook page at www.facebook.com/thelastlions.
- Mobile Texting program: Text LIONS to 50555 to donate $10 to our Big Cats Initiative. This messaging is on the end of the film, as well as on a number of other platforms.
Follow us on Twitter 
Stephen Frink Photography – Zambia and Botswana Safari
Photographer Stephen Frink’s blog from his latest EXPLORE African Safari to Botswana and Zambia (http://stephenfrink.blogspot.com/2010/08/african-safari-zambia-and-botswana.html):
Click here to see the photographs of Stephen Frink’s daughter, Alexa (http://stephenfrink.blogspot.com/2010/07/alexa-shoots-africa.html):
I’ve recently come home from an extraordinarily productive photo tour, on safari in Southern Africa, Zambia and Botswana specifically. Organized by our friends at Explore Africa, http://www.exploreafrica.net, this tour began at Lion Camp in Zambia, and then went on to Selinda and Jao camps in Botswana.
Here is a brief photo diary of the trip and its many, many highlights:
Our first camp was Lion Camp in Zambia. We specifically chose that because the game viewing is so very good there. Elizabeth at Explore suggested it, knowing that we would likely get enough stellar images the first few days that part of our photo imperative might be satisfied. She was so right! The first night we witnessed a leopard killing an impala. Good for us and our photo-ops. Not so great for the impala. Of course, that was on top of all the other general game (in the bush and along the rivers) we shot during the day.
The second night we witnessed another leopard kill, and the third night a lion kill. This kind of trifecta of predation I’ve never seen anywhere else on safari, and this was the 8th safari we’ve conducted in both southern Africa and East Africa.
Leaving Lion Camp and Zambia we flew into Botswana, cleared customs and then were flown via private aircraft to Selinda Camp, a private game reserve and lodge owned and operated by renown wildlife photography and cinema team, Beverly and Dereck Joubert. We’d met on safari three years previously, when I was leading a tour to Mombo Camp in Botswana and the Jouberts had just to shoot some stock footage. Coincidentally, the same day we’d earlier seen a beautiful scenario of a young leopard cub and mother in a nearby den. Dereck began filming this cub as it grew, for over three years actually, an experience which eventually evolved into a film, Eye of the Leopard, for National Geographic.
I’ve always been impressed with the Joubert’s visions of Africa, so intimate and respectful of the wildlife, and I figured if they felt the game opportunities were motivation to run a camp here, I would confidently follow their lead. Selinda did not disappoint!
A brief tip of the hat to Explore again for the air arrangements. We had private aircraft for our group of 19 at each camp, and they operated on time with the utmost courtesy and professionalism. When you are far away and in remote locations, that is great comfort.
Selinda offered the opportunity for game viewing from vehicles or boats, and because there is so much water in the Delta where they operate, Derek has chosen vehicles equipped with snorkels so they operate in water deeper than the floorboards. From hippos in the river to lions prowling the high grasses, this was an very productive camp, that operates at the highest level of service.
The highlight of our Selinda experience was watching a pride of lions with their young leaving for a night’s hunt. We photographed them in the gorgeous late afternoon light and into the dark as the searched for game, and eventually rendezvoused with the dominant male lion.
Like Selinda, Jao Camp is one of the premier safari properties operated by Wilderness Safaris. I’ve come to expect nothing but the best from a Wilderness Safaris property, and since Jao offered both excellent game viewing and an upscale spa ambiance, this is where we chose as our final camp.
This was a year of exceptional rain in the Okavango Delta, not while we were there, as is was beautifully sunny the whole time. But earlier in the year they had their most rain in several decades, and it meant that some of the roads near camp that might normally offer game viewing were underwater. However, the best game opportunities are but a 45-minute boat ride away anyway, at Hunda Island. Here we saw vast plains of grasses with elephants, giraffe, zebra, and of course the cats, both leopard and lion.
Being a Delta camp, Jao delivers the water activities quite well, including stable boats large enough for 8-10 photographers, and less stable but more intimate merkoros (like narrow dug-out canoes, but made of fiberglass these days) to offer a water-level view of the the vegetation of the Okavango.
Thanks to Explore and Lion Camp, Selinda, and Jao. This was the greatest safari experience yet, and we look forward now to the next one, hopefully soon!
To see the amazing images our 17-year old daughter Alexa took on this same safari, please visit my earlier blog post from July, here at http://stephenfrink.blogspot.com/2010/07/alexa-shoots-africa.html. It is easier to simply scroll up to the “July” tab on this page, and click on “Alexa Shoots Africa”. Yeah, I know, she kicked my butt. I’d say “beginner’s luck” but she had a terrific shoot on our last safari too. She has a great eye for composition, very instinctive.
-Stephen Frink, Photographer, www.stephenfrink.com