A guy who is not quite on board with the invasive white men is singled out for probably being drunk — men of the village mostly drink all day anyway because there are no jobs, the (white) narrator says.
It all goes down badly, with the white entrepreneurs loftily pronouncing what’s good for the villagers, and dropping a few dollars on them here and there, without mentioning the huge prices they’d get for running big game hunts.
“Killing the Shepherd” begins impressively, with an animated cave drawing preceding the opening credit.
But director Ta Opre does most of the work here, serving also as writer, cinematographer, editor and on screen narrator, who also comes up with the idea of a second use for decommissioned poacher snares — turn them into bracelets that can be sold online in the states.
A tense orchestral soundtrack runs seemingly independently of what’s on the screen. The more the film goes on, there’s a stronger disconnect between the occasional flashes of big game and the reality of the village in Zambia – as if the nature shots is stock footage spliced in as hopeful thinking.
There is certainly a good documentary to be made about the issues facing African villages, wildlife and commercial big game hunters, especially one with this much fine photography. But this certainly isn’t it. Hardly the “human rights and environmental documentary” it sells itself as being, it never quotes arguments from conservationists on the other side, or even hints that there might even be another side.
The UK- based Born Free Foundation, for the record, states plainly “Trophy hunting is not a conservation or animal management tool, nor does it contribute significant funds to conservation programs or local communities; it is a cruel relic from colonial times that should be consigned to history where it belongs.”
But that’s not something you’d expect to see in essentially a PR film for the industry and this firm in particular.
“Killing the Shepherd” will be available on Nov. 27 – Jan. 15, 2022 at www.killingtheshepherd.com.