Author: Ian-Malcolm Rijsdijk, Senior Lecturer in Film and Television Studies, University of Cape Town

The Last Ranger is South Africa’s latest Oscar nominated film – and the only African movie on the 2025 shortlist for the career-making US awards. The 28-minute short film, shot on location in a game reserve in the Eastern Cape province and told in isiXhosa, focuses on rhino poaching. It’s a fiction film based on a real incident (the end credits slip into documentary mode to show footage of the rhino named Thandi that inspired the story). It’s been touted by many commentators as a likely winner in the Live Action Short Film category at the Oscars. The action is…