Customer Reviews

Africa's Wildlife Collection

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I resent having to do AMAZON's job, but people should know what is included in the contents of this collection. These are National Geographic films shown on Television from the 1970s through the 1990s about African wildlife at that time. The African Wildlife Collection contains twelve National Geographic films, two on each DVD disc, on a total of six DVD discs.

Beauty and the Beasts: A Leopard's Story (*****)
This excellent 1995 nature film is about a leopard in the Mala Mala game reserve, within South Africa's Kruger National Park.
The film shows the leopard's activities, as well as wart hogs (prey), lions and hyenas (competitors), and at the end it even shows the leopard catching an impala leaping thru the air.

Wings over the Serengeti (***)
This 1995 nature film is about the "clean-up crew" that disposes of the animal (remains) waste from the plains of the Serengeti, Tanzania. The focus is on the White-backed (Griffon) Vulture, but also shows the other vultures (like the Egyptian) as well as the Dung Beetle and the services they all perform to keep the natural world clean.

Survivors of the Skeleton Coast (***)
This 1984 nature film by Des & Jen Bartlett was made on the south-west coast of Namibia, which is a desert on the western sea coast of southern Africa. The focus of this great film is on the existance of the desert Elephants, as well as the desert Lions (which were all eventually killed by farmers).

Elephants (*)
This 1977 film is an overview of Elephants in captivity (both in zoos and domesticated) as well as in the wild.

Wildlife Warriors ( )
This film by Beverly and Derek Joubert is about Botswana's National Park Services attempt to combat poachers. They have instituted armed patrols in an effort to protect their dwindling wildlife from the cruel poachers.

African Wildlife (**)
This nature film by Carol and David Hughes is a story about the wildlife during one year in the Etosha Pan, Namibia. The Etosha Pan is a desert like area that is periodically flooded (two feet deep, but fifty miles wide) during the rainy season. It shows the rain, birth, mating, the dry season and the migration of zebra, wildebeest, elephants and lions.

Zebras, A Pattern in the Grass (****)
This 1991 nature film by Beverly and Derek Joubert shows the yearly migrations of the Zebras in Botswana, Africa. It tells a cohesive story about the Zebra life cycle using their film of the African wilderness.

Rhino War ( )
This film predicts the eventual extinction of the Black Rhino, caused by the demand for their horn in Chinese medicine and for the Arabian knife handles that signify manhood. It tells people to boycott animal products (in the 1980s), to help prevent the slaughter of Rhinos for their horns and Elephants for their ivory tusks.

Lions of Darkness (*****)
This 1993 nature film by Beverly and Derek Joubert shows the life cycle of a Lion pride in Botswana, Africa. It shows the milestones of a lion pride by following the experiences of a lion cub named Tao. It shows the lion pride and then the take over by new male lions (but does not show the killing of cubs). It follows the birth of Tao and his introduction into the lion pride, the death of his mother from a broken jaw, his traumatic three day loss in the wilderness and rejoining the pride. It shows his struggle to survive in the pride. The film ends when Tao reaches puberty and his inevitable expulsion from the pride to become an adolescent nomadic lion.

Walking with Lions (***)
This nature film by Lynne & Philip Richardson is about a pride of lions whose territory is around a spring in Zimbabwe, Africa. It shows these lions hunting Buffalo, mating and raising their cubs to rule that African oasis.

Gorillas (*)
This 1981 film narrated by E.G. Marshall presents an overview of gorillas in the wild and in zoos (captivity), including experiments with KoKo the gorilla who can communicate using sign language.

Search for the Great Apes (**)
The first half of this nature film covers the work being done in Borneo to rescue and rehabilitate orphan Orangutans. It also covers their research in to normal orangutan life in the jungles of Borneo.
The second half of this nature film covers the work done in Rwanda by Dian Fossey and her amazing work (fostered by Leaky) to study the life of the mountain gorilla. Includes some good film of gorillas in the wild. There is a summary of Dian Fossey's work and her murder in 1985 at the end of this film. Unfortunately there is not enough film to explore each of these subjects in depth.

The rating system is from zero (bad) to five (excellent) stars (*****) placed next to the film title. Although these film stories are rated, the picture quality of all these films is excellent. Of course these ratings are my personal opinon as a nature film lover who grew up watching these films on PBS television.

I grew up with the old National Geographic specials on VHS and I was starting to get a little worried that they would never be re-released. Fortunately, my faith was rewarded with this excellent collection.

Most of these specials are programs that have never been released on DVD before and the more contemporary programs that you get with them are also of a very high quality. It is also VERY reasonably priced for what you get in return!

Some of the programs that can be found in this collection are:

Gorilla, a spectacular look at the great ape in the wild and in captivity.

The Rhino War, a thrilling account of the real life heroes trying to keep the black rhino around!

Zebras: Patterns in the Grass, a wonderful and enlightening documentary about this famous animal.

African Wildlife, easily my favorite documentary in the entire collection. This film is broad in scope and reaches a level of beauty and wonder I have only ever seen in one other documentary: Planet Earth

The films I have just listed are only a small portion of what you are given, I have left out at least SIX other documentaries included in this set!

This collection contains some of the best old National Geographic videos transferred on DVD. I collect all the wildlife NG video's and I am so glad that with "Worlds Last Great Places" and "Africa's Wildlife Collection" they have put together 2 of the best box sets you will find. If you are an avid wildlife documentary lover this is a great set 6 DVD's with 2 programs on each you can't beat that. One of my all time favorites is finally on DVD "Beauty and The Beast:A leopards Story","Lions Of Darkness","African Wildlife", and "Rhino Wars" are some more greats.

I am baffled by the negative reviews regarding this DVD set. The set is great! Even my 4 year old son enjoys it and has been asking to watch them again.

On one hand, these DVDs present a host of interesting facts and amazing footage all about African wildlife. However, it is completely misleading that the copyright date on this DVD set is 2007. Most of the parts we've seen so far were produced in the early 80s, making the facts almost 30 years old and thus quite outdated. Watching the gorillas, it is claimed that Dian Fossey is alive and well and teaching in the US, when she was brutally murdered in 1985. As I said, the collection is good, but be aware that much has changed in the last 30 years...

I bought this for my 5 year old son, who is obsessed with animals. He loves it. Something the whole family watches together!

I'm very disappointed with this collection. The filming and information given is very old and outdated. Just finished watching the second disk (Gorillas and Great Apes) and it was filmed in 1976! I own lots of documentaries, and this is by far the worst I have. It seems focused more on the history of the awful things people do to African animals. For a huge nature/animal lover like myself, I'm finding it hard to even get interested enough to sit through one episode, let alone the entire collection. If you want to learn about wildlife and the planet then I strongly suggest purchasing the Planet Earth or Blue Planet Collections. They are both much more informative and current, not to mention breathtaking to watch. This DVD set just doesn't even come close in quality.

Good Collection, Contains wonderful shots
Film output is old somewhat, you feel like they didn't use new techniques
Packaging is not good