Product Details

• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, NTSC
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: Nat'l Geographic Vid
• VHS Release Date: May 13, 1997
• Run Time: 60 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 6304438125
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #92,780 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

The parallel stories of a mama leopard and her two cubs and a mother warthog and her brood are tracked in this 60-minute video safari in the Mala Mala Game Preserve in South Africa's Kruger National Park. It's a story of predator versus prey, "lethal beauty" versus "the most astonishing object to ever disgrace nature," according to Academy Award-winning actor James Coburn's rugged narration. (Of course, a generation of kids have grown up with the lovable Pumbaa as their warthog role model, thanks to The Lion King. At the risk of spoiling the ending, parents can rest assured that, oddly, the warthogs all survive.) Cackling hyenas and marauding lions enter the fray and prove as dangerous to the mother leopard as she is to the warthog family. Viewers are not spared the brutality of this truly wild life, and so there are several vivid death scenes. Incongruously, one of them is probably the video's most breathtaking sequence, in which one of the leopard cubs grown up attacks an impala and the two cleave together spiraling through the air in a doomed dance. --Kimberly Heinrichs

Product Description

Predator versus prey in a deadly battle on the African plains. Leopard and warthog: Two unlikely creatures linked by fate on the African savanna. One is predator, the other, prey. This intimate film presents remarkable close-up footage of the leopard, perhaps the wildest of the great cats and its odd-looking neighbor, the warthog. Their parallel lives include age-old scenes of mating, birth, and raising young. But when these lives intersect, the outcome is always the same: The formidable leopard outranks the warthog on the food chain. The night is full of other killers on the African plains. Leopard and warthog are just players of an ongoing struggle to survive, played out at the Mala Mala Game Reserve in South Africa. One of nature's most magnificent natural settings sets the stage for the many dramas in BEAUTY AND THE BEASTS: A LEOPARD'S STORY.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent video!, November 8, 1999

By 

Matthew Ausfahl - See all my reviews

This review is from: National Geographic's Beauty and the Beasts: A Leopard's Story [VHS] (VHS Tape)

Wow! Ever seen a male lion scale a tree to steal the just-killed impala from a leopard? It's here. Ever seen two male lions attack, kill, and eat a maimed, full-grown lioness? It's here too. Ever seen warthogs start munching on a dead wildebeest? Also here. This is Africa "in the raw." Exhilirating.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Wildlife Film!, December 26, 2000

By 

Yan Gluzberg (East Brunswick, New Jersey USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: National Geographic's Beauty and the Beasts: A Leopard's Story [VHS] (VHS Tape)

This is an excellent wildlife documentary, which offers great footage and great story about two different neighbors of South African bush, a leopard and a warthog. We see a leopard cub growing up in a difficult environment with many challenges to a young carnivore. Different challenges are imposed on a brood of young warthogs, which proves to be survivors in a dangerous place. The documentary is full of exceptional footage, which portrays every-day drama facing young leopard and warthogs. We see leopards being harassed by lions and hyenas, warthogs escaping predators and surviving the flood in their burrow. There are great moments and thrill of a leopard hunt, unique footage of lions climbing trees in the effort to get leopard's kill as well as a great escape footage of a warthog. Many episodes are shot at night, an active time for leopards. The drama of predator and prey envelops right in front of our eyes. The leopards are portrayed not only as predators but also as prey to lions and hyenas. The warthogs are portrayed as tough survivors in this harsh place. Great documentary!

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A wild animal lover, January 17, 2006

By 

Joan Chakshuvej "JC" (Chevy Chase, MD USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: National Geographic's Beauty and the Beasts: A Leopard's Story [VHS] (VHS Tape)

When I watched this movie the first time was in my daughter's place in Sandpoint ID, I love it so much end up watch it over and over again and buy several of them as gifts for friends, the love and passion in wild world truly touch my heart, the suvivorship in wild animal kingdom make me cry.

Truly a beautiful female Leopard story everyone will enjoy it.