MILKING THE RHINO
(85 minutes) Kenya/Namibia/South Africa/USA
Director: David E. Simpson
Producers: David E. Simpson, Gordon Quinn
Description: In recent years, conservation in Africa and elsewhere has been turned on its head by a growing consensus that the world's remaining wildlife will not survive unless local people are given a say, and a stake, in preserving it. A feature-length documentary, Milking the Rhino casts a new light on human-wildlife conflict and co-existence in an ever-shrinking world. It portrays African communities at the vanguard of community-based conservation-a radical rethinking of conservation practice that integrates the goals of animal welfare, rural development, and poverty reduction. Milking the Rhino tells powerful and complex tales of indigenous people gaining authority over their own natural resources. The film is also that rare event that places Africans at the center of a hopeful story on the world stage.
Biography: David E. Simpson is a producer, director, and editor who has crafted award-winning films and television for twenty-five years. He directed Refrigerator Mothers, about a generation of mothers who raised autistic children under the shadow of professionally-promoted mother-blame. The film was aired nationally on the PBS series P.O.V. David produced and directed Halsted Street, a multi-award-winning snapshot of America through the prism of one multi-cultural street. He co-produced and directed When Billy Broke His Head, a documentary about disability culture, which garnered international praise including a duPont-Columbia Baton for Journalistic Excellence, a jury award at Sundance. David has directed two new documentaries: Milking The Rhino and The Mind's Eye, which takes viewers deep inside blindness culture through intimate encounters with an ensemble of articulate and expressive characters.
President and founding member of Kartemquin Films, Gordon Quinn has been making documentaries for over forty years. Kartemquin's best known film, Hoop Dreams (1994), executive produced by Gordon, was released theatrically to unprecedented critical acclaim. Its many honors include: the Audience Award at the Sundance Film Festival, The Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award, Chicago Film Critics Award (Best Picture), Los Angeles Film Critics Association (Best Documentary) and an Academy Award Nomination. Gordon has been a long-time supporter of public media, and community-based independent media groups, and served on the boards of The National Coalition of Public Broadcast Producers, The Citizens Committee on the Media, The Chicago Public Access Corporation, The Illinois Humanities Council, The Public Square and The IL Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.
Contact Information: David E. Simpson
Kartemquin Films
1901 W. Wellington
Chicago IL, 60657
E-mail: david@panaceapictures.com
Web site: http://www.kartemquin.com/films/milking-the-rhino
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