Guns have metamorphosed into cameras in this earnest comedy, the ecology safari, because nature has ceased to be what it always had been - what people needed protection from. Now nature tamed, endangered, mortal - needs to be protected from people.
Nature in America has always been suspect, on the defensive, cannibalized by progress. In America, every specimen becomes a relic.
Anything in history or nature that can be described as changing steadily can be seen as heading toward catastrophe.