English summary

‘Seidl at his best.‘

‘Seidl lets the hunters dig their own moral grave.’

 Safari is an unsettling film about the trophy hunting carried out by white tourists in Africa. In his familiar, manicured style involving beautiful camera work, strong compositions and beautifully staged scenes, Seidl shows us all that is involved in this senseless ‘hunt’. And the surrounding controversy goes straight over the heads of the holidaymakers.

Year after year paying German and Austrian tourists spend hours waiting in the game reserves of South Africa and Namibia, beer in hand, for the chance to shoot a lion, zebra or giraffe. What drives these people? Tourist hunters openly talk of the excitement of pulling the trigger: the ultimate exercise of power. They leave the skinning of the carcasses to the poor locals to work for them. That many find their predation perverse is not addressed in this unemotive study of the exploitation of nature by Westerners. But it precisely his lack of judgement while following these people that enables director Seidl to learn their motives.

Safari is Seidl at his best. He previously achieved great success with his Paradise trilogy ‘Liebe’, ‘Hoffnung’, ‘Glaube’.