‘Leopard’ Celebrates Nature’s Beauty, Struggle

We all know about the survival of the fittest, but how about the propaganda of the species? By the end of “The Leopard Son”--the Discovery Channel’s first theatrical release and a first-rate nature film--there’s no arguing that leopards are the king of beasts. And that, in fact, lions are filthy pirates, cheetahs are cowardly, hyenas are opportunists, baboons are demonic and that man does well to stay at the far end of a telephoto lens.

Created by famed naturalist and cinematographer Hugo van Lawick (former collaborator and husband of primatologist Jane Goodall), “The Leopard Son” follows from birth the life struggle of a leopard cub on Africa’s Serengeti plain. With his voice supplied by John Gielgud and a score by former Police drummer Stewart Copeland, Van Lawick chronicles two years in the life of the young cat, with all the ugliness, ecstasy and heartbreak of nature.

I say heartbreak because, even though this is not the Disneyfication of the wild and everything is shot with untrained animals and uncensored death, the film indulges the impulse to ascribe human traits to animals, to judge their character as if they were people, and to root for them on the basis of aesthetics. The prettier the animal, the more we’re inclined to root for it. Blame Bambi.

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But besides being the best-looking of the animals we see (and thus winning half the battle for our hearts), the leopard son is noble, as far as we can tell. We see lions, which, we are told, kill all meat-eating competitors as a matter of policy, digging hyena pups out of a burrow and throttling them. Our hero, on the other hand, climbs a tree to a snake eagle nest and leaves the eaglets unmolested. “He must not have been hungry,” Gielgud/Van Lawick says. But the moral implications are clear.

The photography is breathtaking. The narration, delivered with nonchalant eloquence by Gielgud, makes us intimates with the wild. “I had no idea how far the baboons would take this,” he says worriedly as they chase the leopard son up a tree. “Far better to lose a carcass than to be one,” he intones, when discretion becomes the better part of valor.

What we forget while watching this film is that there’s nothing unique about the story: It’s repeated day after day, year after year, following the blueprint and imprint of nature in an endless cycle of eating, being eaten and living a life based on small victories. The parallels with human existence, obviously, are pointed and painful. But Van Lawick eases the way, giving us a world that’s visually stunning and telling his story as if it’s never been told. And may never be again.

* MPAA rating: G. Times guidelines: Inter-species violence may be disturbing.

‘The Leopard Son’

John Gielgud: Voice of Hugo van Lawick

A Discovery Pictures and Nature Conservation Films production, released by Discovery Pictures. Director Hugo van Lawick. Producer Mick Kaczorowski. Screenplay Michael Olmert. Cinematographers Van Lawick and Matthew Aeberhard. Editors Mark Fletcher, Gerrit Netten. Music Stewart Copeland. Running time: 1 hour, 24 minutes.

* At selected theaters throughout Southern California.