My good friends at Profilm - an Icelandic production house that I have worked with on different projects over the years are back in Thailand to film the follow up to their beautiful film - "The disappearing World Of The Asian Elephant" This was the first film I worked on with them and it was bought by many major networks and screened all over the world in many different languages.
They approached me back then because as an underwater cameraman they wanted to know about the possibilities of filming an elephant underwater. I said I was game and we tried our best to find the location that was deep enough for me to get below an elephant swimming. It's these images from The Andaman Islands that we wanted to replicate....
We settled on Koh Lanta to try and film this scene but try as we might the elephant refused to swim. We were left with some still spectacular shots but not what we had dreamed of. Anyway that's just how it goes filming wildlife - you never can predict exactly what you are going to get.
Profilm's film focused on the fact that the domesticated Asian Elephant was soon to die out and the numbers still living in the true wild were dwindling more and more so that eventual extinction was becoming a very real threat. Asian elephants were used extensively in the logging industry for the last century and before that in warfare. Of course those 2 things are long gone now and the remaining domesticated elephants are used in tourism as trekking elephants.
Nowadays the trekking industry has also taken a hit because there is greater awareness amongst tourists and tour operators that elephant trekking is borderline unethical. The elephants are overworked and forced to cary tourists day in day out with little rest for years on end. Nowadays people would rather just take part in bathing and feeding an elephant. Covid came along and decimated the tourism industry of Thailand which in many ways was the final nail in the coffin for elephant tourism. These huge animals cost a fortune to keep in food and upkeep and they live a very long time.
Many elephant owners are being forced to give up their elephants and are taking them to the reserves and refuges that are found around the country. In the documentary we focused on the amazing lady Khun Lek that has been caring for these elephants for most of her life. Now she is inundated with more and more trekking elephants that have been literally dumped on her doorstep.
It was decided now was the time to film the second part of that documentary and Profilm is here now preparing for the filming and I too will be part of it. We shall follow up on the park that Lek has established, meet Edwin from the WFFT and also see how the trekking industry has evolved in to something better and safer for these gentle giants. We will look at the issues of habitat loss as human populations spill over into national parks and the dangers that elephants face from poachers and villagers tired of their crops being trampled and eaten by hungry elephants.
Here are some clips of the first documentary and I believe the full film can be seen on different streaming services as well. I'm super excited to be filming again with Profilm and I will endeavour to update here on different parts of the behind the scenes.
Elephant crisis from Profilm on Vimeo.