How do wildlife films represent organisms, and what are the consequences for our notions of nature and culture? I will argue that wildlife films are simulations: specifically, that their images of wildlife simulate organisms in the wild, species, and theories of wildlife behaviour. These simulations result in a perpetuation of established categories of nature and culture, which are promoted through this major popular medium. This narrated portrayal of wildlife, combining entertainment and education, feeds back on our conceptions of both nature and human family values. This talk will break down the category of simulation into its multiple and overlapping dimensions of observation, experiment, and demonstration, employing examples from the history of the wildlife film genre. At this point I will distinguish between models and simulations, where the former stand in for phenomena while the latter act out the behaviour of phenomena; wildlife films are thus more appropriately simulations than they are models. I will consider the images of wildlife showcased in wildlife films as the components of simulations. This characterization holds both in terms of the interventions of “natural history artifice” (staging or fakery) throughout the history of the wildlife film genre as well as in non-interventionist filmmaking, which nevertheless simulates wildlife behaviour.