You Only Peddle What You Can Sell

CWW has posted multiple times in regard to Kevin Richardson’s involvement in the upcoming movie Mia And The White Lion. Our information has been met with a gamut of responses, from alarm and dismay at finding that Richardson is not the person people once believed him to be, to outright rejection of the verified facts we’ve provided. Accepting the understanding that a figurehead as immensely popular as someone like the “Lion Whisperer” is just that, a figurehead, not an actual hero, is not easy. No one enjoys finding out that they’ve been duped, no one wants to discover that their goodwill, and their trust, has been abused.

One more fact about Mia And The White Lion (MTWL) which might shock readers is that this is the second feature length film made off the backs of exploited lions made using lions managed by Kevin Richardson. MTWL is currently being touted in its press blurbs as “ambitious” and the story described as unique, and captivating because real lions, rather than CGI (which ethical film companies now use) were used in the making of the movie.

But the truth is that MTWL is nothing more than an old trope wrapped up in new publicity, and presented to a new audience.

Ten years ago, the movie White Lion was released. The film came on the heels of the publication of Kevin Richardson’s biography “Part of the Pride” which allowed the two to evoke support for each other, stirring up interest and excitement. It was a grand marketing scheme. Richardson’s biography (despite being disjointedly written, and largely self-serving) rode various best seller lists just like Richardson riding one of his lion “brothers” for the camera, while White Lion gathered three SAFTA awards.

Few viewers had/have any grasp of just how many lions were utilized in the making of White Lion, the majority of which were then used as breeders for the cub-petting industry, sold, or succumbed to unknown ends.

74 lions (about 25 white and the rest tawny) were used in the production of White Lion. The majority of these lions came from Rodney Fuhr’s Lion Park (where Richardson worked for over ten years) which regularly bred lions like cattle for the tourist industry (something Richardson actively participated in) as well as for sale to other breeding facilities. Although in the movie, and its related press, white lions are described as rare and mythical, the Lion Park had a hefty stock of them ready for use in production, and had been breeding them for some time.

When the planned star of White Lion, a lion named Letsatsi (also the name of the main character) had a mental breakdown, literally walking off set and evading capture until he was sedated and recaptured, Richardson was heartbroken undeterred (okay, he did remark on how his “relationship” with the mentally broken lion had soured). He and Fuhr eventually ended up renting a lion named Sphinx from another lion petting facility for the main character. Fuhr’s own Lion Park had bred Sphinx several years before, and Richardson had already habituated him to human interactions before he was sold to the other lion park.

After the filming of White Lion wrapped, Sphinx was hauled back to his own lion park where he lived happily ever after went on to sire more generations of captive lions for use in public interactions and cub-petting. Meanwhile Fuhr’s lions went back to living happily ever after doing the same. A handful of the 74 lions will be familiar to Richardson fans. Thor, Tau, Napoleon, Meg, Amy, Gandalf, etc. But the rest of the lions (those for which Richardson had no use) have been lost to time.

They only existed as what they were, a disposable commodity.

Only those lions with whom Richardson could work intimately, thus supporting his own mythos, were retained.

Now Richardson has procured another crop of white lions for another feature film about mystical white lions. With the film due to release December of this year, Richardson has already welcomed his new lions to his sanctuary.

Just how similar are White Lion, and Mia And The White Lion? Let’s examine them side by side.

White Lion

• Stars a white lion

• Features myths of the Shangaan

• Lion must travel to land of the Shangaan

• Lion protected by an adolescent boy

• Lion is rare, boy is special

• Hunter is seeking white lion because of his coloring

• Lion and boy must face down/evade evil hunter

• Multiple lions used to portray white lion

• Movie was premiered and marketed at the Cannes Film Festival.

• Movie acclaimed for using real lions

• Movie acclaimed for long filming timeline

• Movie acclaimed for actors interacting with real lions

• Movie acclaimed for supposedly promoting lion conservation

• Richardson in charge of procuring all lions used

• Richardson in charge of all lions and interactions

• Richardson subsequently keeps some lions for his own use

Mia And The White Lion

• Stars a white lion

• Features myths of the Shangaan

• Lion must travel to land of the Shangaan

• Lion protected by adolescent girl

• Lion is rare, girl is special

• Hunter is seeking white lion because of his coloring

• Girl and lion must face down/evade evil hunter

• Multiple lions used to portray white lion

• Movie was premiered and marketed at the Cannes Film Festival.

• Movie acclaimed for using real lions

• Movie acclaimed for long filming timeline

• Movie acclaimed for actors interacting with real lions

• Movie acclaimed for supposedly promoting lion conservation

• Richardson in charge of procuring all lions used

• Richardson in charge of all lions and interactions

• Richardson subsequently keeps some lions for his own use

White Lion was anticipated to sell well. Directors and producers said:”We’re very confident and I anticipate a very positive response from Cannes.” Articles described director Horowitz as being “very optimistic that this type of family entertainment will find a place in the international market.” He was quoted as saying “We believe White Lion has all the right ingredients and holds significant business for a distributor.”

Mia And The White Lion was also anticipated to sell well and has been described as a “family adventure film, shot over three years in South Africa, about a 13-year-old girl who develops a rare and special bond with a wild lion.” According to Studiocanal’s head of international sales “People love titles which are marvelously executed and have something really magic and unique,” she went on to say “We are realizing it has a huge potential for Christmas for holidays for families.”

From White Lion’s About page:

The picture is the long-time dream of one of the owners of the Johannesburg Lion Park, Rodney Fuhr. Fuhr independently funded the movie, and filming was approached in a fairly unconventional manner.

Richardson recalled, “WHITE LION has been a long time coming and was Rodney’s vision, dating back to the early eighties. For me, the beauty of this film is its reality component and inherent simplicity...” And “although WHITE LION is a fictional feature film, and we have taken license on some issues, it is not beyond the scope of what could take place in the wild.”

“In recent times, films of this nature, which are basically fictional animal films, have enjoyed great success,” observed Director/Cinematographer Michael Swan. “March of the Penguins is a good example of this, and our movie is very much of the same cloth, although not a documentary. WHITE LION also has a parallel human element, which is complimentary to the lions.

“It’s a film for all age groups,” said Richardson, “with every ingredient to be a runaway hit. And the cubs will pull at the heart strings of the most seasoned moviegoer.”

“Simple films, such as this, are rarely made anymore, yet these are the films we adored as children,”

From Mia And The White Lion’s Pages:

Director de Maistre said“It became obvious to me that I had to make a film about the subject: to imagine the life of a child who creates a powerful bond with a lion and then discovers the unbearable truth! A beautiful idea: a real lion, a real child, their highly intimate bond emphasized and celebrated in order to carry a message supporting wildlife preservation.”

He continued “I spoke to Kevin about it, and even if he was very excited about the concept, he immediately pointed out to me all of the obstacles in making such a film around this idea. Creating a real bond with a wild animal would take a great deal of time and required close contact with the animal from the moment it was born.”

It was thus necessary to imagine a totally unknown filming concept.

“We spoke for days on end and established together a methodology to make my filmmaker’s dream come true. A film shoot that would last 3 years, the time necessary for a lion cub to become an adult, so that the child actor could develop and incorporate Kevin’s know-how, and build his or her own natural bond with the lion.”

This methodology also allows for unique shots and impromptu scenes, usually impossible to obtain on a classic film shoot. Furthermore, this process will allow the child and the lion to develop an exceptional bond which will strengthen the fiction and allow for an inimitable sincerity.

To Recap:

Both films portray the same ideas, the same stories, were made in the same shooting time (3-4 years) Both films are advertised as being unique and unconventional, and both claim to have been made via unconventional filming methods. Both films state clearly that they are fiction, both were made using captive bred and trained lions, but both insist that the intention is to portray “real” things. Both movies were/are being marketed as family movies, with the fact that real lions, not CGI, or other special effects, used as a selling point. This is in sharp contrast to assertions that both movies also claim to teach people that lions should never be exploited by humans. Both movies were made using lions which were bred by lion farms/parks which bred cubs factory-style for the purpose of cub-petting.

Supporters of Richardson have repeatedly insisted to us that the “message” about protecting lions contained in Mia And The White Lion will be important enough to overlook the fact that lions were exploited in order to make it.

We wonder if they also believe that the “message” about protecting lions contained in White Lion was important enough to overlook the fact that lions were exploited in order to make it?

And the next time Richardson decides to buy more lions in order to make more feature length fictional family films, will the “message” about protecting lions contained within those films also be important enough to overlook the fact that lions were exploited in order to make it?

At what point will the LIONS–not fictionally portrayed messages about them–become the most important thing?