The Pandas

Wildscreen Awards UK

The 2004 Wildscreen Film Festival for environmental and wildlife documentaries took place in the second week of October in Bristol, uk. The festival's Panda Awards bestowed prizes on an eclectic mix of documentaries. The prestigious Golden Panda award went to The Elephant the Emperor and the Butterfly Tree, a documentary produced by osf productions, uk. The documentary focuses on the mopane tree of the African bush, and its fragile ecosystemic links of worm, elephant, moth and humans. Indian film makers picked up a couple of awards. Ajay and Vijay Bedi won the Best Newcomer Award for The Policing Langur. The 30 minute documentary explores human-monkey relationship in Indian urban life: monkeys raiding houses and hospitals and humans retaliating with violence. Another Indian documentary The Vanishing Giants by Mike Pandey and Ritambara Rana, was awarded best news feature. The film caused controversy in India, causing the government change laws regarding elephant treatment.