Africa's Wild West - Stallions of the Namibian Desert

Golden dunes, white salt pans, brooding dark-brown rock crags and infinite savanna stretching to the deep blue horizon. The Namibian desert along Africa’s south western coast boasts some of the continent‘s most stunning landscapes. And one big surprise: Africa’s only population of Wild Horses.

Most species In the world’s oldest and driest desert are specialists that have adapted to these harsh conditions over tens of thousands of years: oryx, ostrich and hyenas. Yet the wild horses of the Namib were imported from Europe just over a hundred years ago.

Some were the pack animals of the German colony’s diamond prospectors, others were brought in by opposing armies when war broke out in 1914. In 1918 they were released, unwanted, into a desert of abandoned ghost towns - the horses of Africa’s Wild West.

Here they still live, in spite of drought, heat and constant sandstorms, and the nightly attacks of hyenas. In fact they owe their survival to the colonists. When diamonds were discovered the colonists created the Sperrgebiet, a Forbidden Zone 300 km long and 100km wide, that incidentally protected the region’s wildlife from all human interference.

A Production of Interspot Film for ORF Universum in cooperation with NDR Naturfilm doclights and Arte.

Awards:

• New York Festival: Gold Medal
  
• Deauville Green Awards Festival: Gold Award
  
• Cannes Corporate Media & TV Awards 2015: Silver Award
  
• US International Film & Video Festival 2016: Certificate of Creative Excellence