Over the next few days, weeks and months, Caithness big game hunter Guy Wallace expects to become a much-despised figure of hate, yet joked: “You’ll probably be reading my obituary next week.”
He is the subject of a controversial documentary film released this week, End of the Game, which had its world premiere at the Glasgow Film Festival.
It’s made by film-maker and committed vegan David Graham Scott, from Wick, who has also put himself in the firing line by befriending the big game hunter and accompanying him to Africa where he filmed his attempts to kill a Cape buffalo.
The film explores the ethical issues around hunting but also delves deeper into the unlikely bond that develops between the two men.
Guy lives with a Swahili talking parrot and has just one-and-a-half teeth – the result of eating too much buffalo meat in his younger days, he tells me, while his broad moustache and the pipe often found clamped between his lips make him look like a figure that has stepped from the pages of a history book.
His attitude towards hunting will make some feel that the past is where he belongs, but Guy says he “doesn’t give a monkeys” about what other people think.
“I’ve never been ashamed of what I’ve done,” he said.
An unrepentant relic of the colonial era, Guy has been a soldier, serving both with a parachute regiment and the Gordon Highlanders; a mercenary and a tracker.
Until this month he lived in splendid isolation in a battered old caravan on the Caithness moors.
“I’ve lived in mud huts, stone huts in the desert and corrugated iron shacks in South America so I’m not fussy, plus you can only use one chair, one plate, one cup at a time so there’s no point in having lots of stuff,” said Guy.
He is now relocating to Spain, a move he assures me was planned years ago, and nothing to do with the controversial film being released.
“I’ve been hill farming in Caithness since 2002 but I’m 75 now and had enough of it,” said Guy, who has also been a professional gun dog trainer for 40 years.
He’s led something of a “Boy’s Own” life, one full of adventure and drama, but as he approached the golden years of his life, he had one burning, remaining ambition – to hunt and kill a Cape buffalo.
“Hunting is one of the oldest things in the world and if it wasn’t for hunting the human race would have died out years ago. I know it was a necessity then but in some parts of rural Africa, it still is,” said Guy.
“David sees me as a Victorian hunter, but I was brought up with field sports from a very early age by my grandfather and uncles and inherited their ethics, something which has rather gone out of the window these days.
“There is a very strict code of conduct which I always follow. The professional hunter on the safari we filmed in Africa was rather surprised when I told him that I would not shoot within 500 yards of the vehicle or within 500 yards as it is unethical.
“The hunter said it would completely reduce my chances of shooting a Cape buffalo so I said, so be it, I’m not prepared to compromise.
“During the dry season, which is the hunting season, the animals need their water and, until the rains come, there are not many places to drink, so to ambush them at a waterhole absolutely stinks.
“I wanted to hunt a mature Cape buffalo, one that has been pushed out of the herd by the younger buffalo. They often end up being hunted by young lions so they run into thorn patches where the lions will spend days slowly attacking them which leads to a slow, lingering and painful death.
“In Britain there’s nothing that fights back – a salmon or fox is unlikely to kill you, but with a Cape buffalo it’s a case of you kill him or he kills you.
“If you turn your back and run, you are dead. You must stand your ground.
“You have to be ready for it and you have to be practiced. I have fired rifles since 1965 and shot more than 1,000 British deer to control them. I’m not a trophy hunter but having a trophy is a great visual reminder of that hunting experience.”
Guy is ready to face his critics as he’s used to being in the firing line, as for years he was a professional huntsman on horseback, controlling a pack of 40 foxhounds in England and Wales.
“When I was fox-hunting, wearing my scarlet coat and leading the pack of hounds I had all sorts of abuse directed at me. People would shout and scream at me but they were just a bit of a nuisance.
“I’ve always known that some people won’t understand why I hunt but what you have to look at is why are they anti hunting? There are always two sides to everything. As Robert Quillan said: ‘Discussion is an exchange of knowledge, an argument an exchange of ignorance’.
“When people shout and start spouting stuff it shows they obviously haven’t studied the subject at all. David, at least, could see where I was coming from.
“If a complete stranger had phoned and said I’m an anti-hunting vegan and want to make a film about you in Africa I’d have said I wasn’t interested, but we were friends already and understood each other.”
Speaking ahead of the movie launch, Guy said: “I invited my chums to the premiere and told them to bring a few mates along as there would probably be a lot more bunny huggers there than
red-blooded men of the veldt.”
And after years of hunting, he’s decided that he’d like to meet his maker in the same quick manner he dispatches his prey.
“I’ve always said that being killed by an animal would be better than hanging around an NHS waiting room – and I still say that,” said Guy.
Film director David Graham Scott said: “People are a strange mix and don’t see the world in black and white, and while Guy is a controversial character, there’s a gentle side to him.
“End of the Game is an incredible, contentious, controversial, funny and at times a demanding film and if you come to it with a narrow view of the universe where human beings are written off because of one aspect of their life, then you’ll probably hate it because I gave this man time to air his views – views which are not necessarily views I or others agree with.
“I still hate animal cruelty, would never shoot a living thing and step around insects on the pavement but as a documentary-maker, I have to be open-minded.
“There will be people who say why did I give Guy the time of day but I say why not? I’m a documentary maker and Guy is one of the most extraordinary characters I’ve met and great documentary material.
“I hope people will see that the film is somewhat poetic in that it paints a picture of an old man in decline, but I’m not romanticising him or big game hunting, although in a strange way parallels can be drawn between Guy and the old Cape buffalo, a gnarly old beast who, if not shot, would face a horrible death being torn down by lions.
“The Cape buffalo is not an endangered species and money from this type of hunt goes into conservation.
“It wasn’t a particularly pleasant thing to watch but, if you pardon the pun, you have to respect Guy for sticking to his guns.”
