Why You Have To Watch Kathryn Bigelow's New Short Film, Last Days

The director of The Hurt Locker and Dark Zero Thirty is behind this emotional plee to end elephant poaching

Kathryn Bigelow is one of the most important female directors of our time, having won countless awards for her films The Hurt Locker and Dark Zero Thirty - but now she's moving away from the war on terror and towards the war on the ivory trade.

Her new film, Last Days, is an emotional three minute piece that highlights the financial link between terrorism and poaching. But rather than show harrowing scenes of elephants being murdered for their tusks, Kathryn has decided to use animation, mixed with footage of the extremist jihadist group, al-Shabaab's attacks on the Westgate Mall in Kenya. Why? Because Al-Shabaab makes nearly £400,000 per month from the illegal ivory trade.

Kathryn told Time Magazine 'Last year I was made aware of the very real connection between elephant poaching and terrorism. For me it represented the diabolical intersection of two problems that are of great concern - species extinction and global terrorism. Both involve the loss of innocent life, and both require urgent action. An elephant disappears every 15 minutes. It is our hope that this film helps bring an activist into existence at least that often.'

The reason Kathryn decided to put out this short film, rather than making a feature length version, was because more elephants would be hunted in the years it took to make what would no doubt become an oscar-winning movie - although Last Days is no less brilliant than anything the director has done before. Kathryn hopes to urgently inspire action with her new film, which is more easily accessible to all, before these beautiful creatures become extinct.

Watch the film and find out more about how you can help at lastdaysofivory.com