South Africa’s breakout film STROOP – journey into the rhino horn war has won the prestigious Genesis Award in the ‘Outstanding Brigitte Bardot International Documentary Feature Film’ category in the United States.

The Genesis Awards recognise excellent work in media with a special focus on outstanding reporting of animal protection issues.

The winners, in only 15 categories, included Stephen Spielberg’s Jurassic World, for tackling wildlife trafficking, Natalie Portman’s vegan film Eating Animals, Ellen DeGeneres, for her talkshow that continually highlights gorilla protection issues, as well as iconic American institutions like the New York Times, 60 Minutes and Sesame Street.

Due to the popularity of the film and the recent Encounters win, STROOP will be returning to the big screen for a limited re-release at Johannesburg’s independent theatre, The Bioscope.

This will be the first time the film will screen at this iconic venue as it has already be shown at Nu Metro cinemas around the country, Ster-Kinekor’s Cinema Nouveau and at Cape Town’s Labia Theatre.

The Bioscope will run STROOP for a full week, as a Special Screening of the Encounters Audience Award Winner, with a filmmaker Q&A on the opening night, Friday, July 26.

Since its world premiere at the San Francisco Green Film Festival in September last year, STROOP has been officially selected for 28 film festivals and has won 20 awards.

The film has been picked up by the London-based Journeyman Pictures for international distribution and Scott and de Bod are in talks with local broadcasters and hope to announce soon a South African television transmission date.