Secret Brazil

The heart of South America hides a remote and secret world, a violent Paradise. Searing drought and devastating flood shape the lives of exotic creatures that battle to survive. An area ten times the size of Florida's Everglades, the Pantanal wetland lies in the heart of Brazil. It looks idyllic, but life here is harsh. As the annual floodwaters drain away, Brazil's Pantanal becomes big cat territory. The battles of jaguars and caimans play out on a stage set by the most extreme elements on Earth. Land animals must snatch their chance to eat, meet, and breed.

The vast power of water creates one of the largest wetlands on the planet, the Pantanal, and gives rise to a teeming concentration of animals. Surging across the heart of Brazil, heavy rains herald its arrival as it unleashes an incredible metamorphosis, transforming the land of the jaguar into the underwater world of the anaconda and piranha. Two Brazilian wildlife cinematographers, Lawrence Wahba and Haroldo Palo Jr., capture a years dramatic milestones in the lives of caimans, anacondas, giant river otters and piranhas as they face the challenge of survival in the changing environment as it drowns and dries out.

National Geographic filmmakers Lawrence Wahba and Haroldo Palo Jr. penetrate a remote and secret world in the heart of South America, a violent Paradise where searing drought and devastating flood shape the lives of exotic creatures battling to survive. Roughly the size of Florida, Brazil's Pantanal wetland looks idyllic, but life here is harsh. In the first of three programs, as the annual floodwaters drain away, the wars of jaguar and caiman play out on a stage set by the most extreme elements on Earth. The second show reveals caiman, anacondas and giant river otters spreading far and wide in the floods. In the concluding program, the filmmakers share their own secrets, including how they captured jaguars as never seen before.