a savage, riveting documentary

This is without question the most violent, horrific animal documentary I have ever seen; the fight for survival between the lions and hyenas is brutal, but goes beyond fighting over food, to actual territorial warfare. The cruelty shown in this footage should not be seen by children, but is extremely educational for those who have the stomach for it.
There is also a segment on the agony of a poisoned lioness that is terribly sad, and hard to watch.

You will learn things about hyenas that will surprise you: It is a matriarchal society, where the males are smaller, and their role in the pack quite marginal. The females also have the appearance of hermaphrodites, and engage in "mock mating", caught on film here for the first time. We also witness their habit of fratricide, where the most powerful of the young will kill its weaker brother or sister.
The ferocity of the hyenas, coupled with their "laughing" sounds, make these scavengers truly "the horrors of the night".

Much of this documentary is chilling, some of it is very moving, and all of it is unforgettable. Filmed in the northern regions of Botswana, the creative forces behind this film are Dereck and Beverly Joubert, and the narration of the beautifully written (and often quite poetic) script is by Powers Boothe.
Watching a film like this puts the harshness of nature into perspective, and also says a lot about our lower instincts, and the "endless cycles of life and death", shown here with some spectacular cinematography.
Total running time is one hour.

Shakespeare couldn't have written this story better

Documentaries on wildlife are totally fascinating to me, but that's not what this is.
Eternal Enemies is the opposite of, say, National Geographic's documentary on the costa rican rainforests, which teased you with an intro showing clips of howler monkies and leopards but turned out to be mostly details about the behavior of social insects. Eternal Enemies isn't education, it's drama. At times, really compelling drama. These aren't anonymous tired animals, few and far between in a habitat steadily being destroyed by civilization. It isn't a guilt trip about the selfless efforts of scientists to study and help save some endangered population. They managed to find an area of africa that is FULL of all kinds of wildlife, and focus on specific characters that play out an amazing and unsettling war story. It's not just fascinating, it's emotionally involving, full of malice, violent aggression, deliberate torture, regicide, fratricide, and infanticide. It seriously is like Shakespeare.

Powerful snapshot of nature

This video has moments that will leave you awestruck. I wish they would release it on DVD. The final chase sequence with the enforcer lion taking out the hyena clan leader is a haunting piece of footage. The Joberts must have spent years waiting to capture a moment like that on film.