Southern Star Sales has acquired international rights to a wildlife
special about the camels of central Australia which has started filming around Alice Springs.
Silhouettes of the Desert Sands is being filmed over three years,
following many years of research and planning by filmmaker David Curl.
Trained as a zoologist at Oxford and Monash Universities, Curl has lived in Australia's Northern Territory for more than a decade. His first film, The Call of Kakadu, screened on Australia's Nine Network in April this year and has won eight international awards as well as being broadcast in more than 30 countries.
"My first film was the result of eight years' research and filming, and this new film is on the same sort of time scale," David Curl said. "The world's best wildlife films are nearly all made by people living with their subjects for more than a year - sometimes for many years. I
believe you can only hope to capture the essence of a place on film if
you know it intimately - and that can take a long time.
"I've lived at the base of Uluru (Ayers Rock) for more than three years and I never cease to be amazed by the place. I've been filming now for more than a year and the camels have become much more accustomed to the sight of me and my camera - allowing me the most intimate shots of mothers and young or of adult males fighting in the desert dust. The behaviour of these powerful animals is exceptionally interesting - yet little known. Most people overseas don't even know we've got camels in Australia at all - let alone the largest population of wild camels anywhere in the world," Curl said.
Chief executive of Southern Star Sales, Robyn Watts, said she expected
the film to be the definitive work about the camels of central
Australia. "This will be a first class work," Ms Watts said. "We're
delighted to be involved with David Curl so early on in his production
which we expect to be an exceptional blue chip wildlife special."
Southern Star is an integrated film and television production,
distribution and manufacturing group. Divisions of the company are
involved in film, television and video production; video, audio tape and optical disc duplication; sales and distribution; new media and
licensing and merchandising. Southern Star is a publicly listed company.
