The Kenyan capital of Nairobi combines opposites. This metropolis with three million inhabitants is among the most modern of cities on the African continent. At the same time, the Nairobi National Park begins practically at Nairobi’s doorstep. This is the boundary where raw wilderness and human civilization meet: just outside the city limits, a simple chain-link fence marks the edge of the Park where lions, hyenas, giraffes and rhinos roam through the grass. The film shows how humans and wild animals – side by side, and sometimes face to face – are sharing life in the big city.
Udo Maurer was born in Bruck/Mur (Austria) in 1960. In 1979, after he finished his school in Electrical Engineering, he started his studies at Filmakademie Wien (Camera and Editing). In the 1986, he won a scholarship in Los Angeles and an internship at John Bailey, ASC. He started then to work as a cinematographer in feature film, commercial, documentaries in Austria, U.S.A. and Turkey. Since 1994 he works as a director and cinematographer for ORF, Spiegel TV and Discovery-Channel, with internationally successful documentaries. Über Wasser was his first documentary released in cinema.