Grizzly Man

[Taco]

This thread will probably have a lot of what might be considered SPOILERS. Even though this is a documentary, and there isn't really an active plot, or anything.

La la la. So my brother, his roommate and I watched this documentary from last year, on Saturday Night, about Tim Treadwell and his footage that was left after he and his girlfriend were killed by bears in either late Summer or early Fall of 2003. For 13 years, the guy would go to some remote Alaskan wilderness area somewhere (I don't remember exactly where) and spend two months constantly in the physical presence of bears (it already sucks, but what makes it suck even more was that that girl decided to go with him the year that he died, and therefore died too.) There are various shots of bears coming right up to the camera, or right up to him.

It's similar to a discovery channel special on animals, except that it's more about Treadwell than the bears, really. Treadwell was very colorful. There are a few quotes from him from this movie that just stick in my head:

"That's a big bear! That's a big bear! That's a big bear!" (after this bear walked up to him and the camera.)
"You knock it off! You knock it off! Oh I'm sorry! I still love you! It's okay!" (after this bear was grabbing his arm, or something.)
"We need some fucking water, so the fish can make a run! [bear] is starving! [another bear] is starving! [yet another bear] is eating her cubs! Come on, Jesus Kid! Come on, [something else]! Come on, Hindu... floaty thing!"
"I'm touching the poop! I'm able to touch the poop! I can actually feel it!"

All of those are more or less what he said. I don't really remember exactly what he said anymore, but it was awesome. There was also one point in the movie where he goes off on this tirade against the government and its regulations on living in the wild, in which he used a lot of "**** you!"s. Heh. The guy was fairly eccentric, or something, but he was awesome. I also really liked all the animals a lot. Especially the foxes. The foxes acted like a combination of a cat and a dog. There was one that had jumped on top of his tent, and was biting at his fingers through the tent.

There were also a lot of interviews with people, who were either like "He was awesome!" or "He was a retard, and shouldn't have been out there!" (well, maybe not that extreme.) Basically, the reason Treadwell ended up dying might've been because he went back to the spot after he would have normally been gone at that point in the year, and there were other bears there than the ones he knew. One of them was the one that killed him.

So, what did you think of the movie? What did you think of Treadwell, also? Should he have been out there? Was he some crazy environmentalist?

Personally, I don't see why he shouldn't have. Maybe he broke a few rules here and there, but he was doing what most nature show hosts do. He knew the risks, and he said several things that would lead one to believe that maybe this was how he wanted to die, anyway. I'm not sure how he thought he was protecting the bears, but oh well. Then again, like someone who was interviewed in the movie said, maybe his being out there lead the animals to believe that all humans were okay to be around, and therefore endanger them to poachers and the like... tough call.

Wuv, Yer Mom

EDIT: Oh yeah, and post 1,500. Yay for me! Or something.

[OnOneRyder]

I've actually been curious about renting this movie, but I was never a fan of documentary's, so I can't comment on the movie itself. I can however say that I live in a province with a lot of enviromentalists. Not the type like peta (won't eat a cow but will let polution fill the air which kills more), but the type who actually go out and co-exist with animals, usually only for a short time though and I must say they're some of the most sane people you'll ever meet. I meet one guy who spent 6 months with camping gearing tracking the kermode bear just north of the queen charlottes and he was having more fun doing that than any of us could going out with friends and doing what we call "fun". So maybe this guy didn't die in vain, he loved what he did. At least he enjoyed his life.

As for the bears themselves, those suckers are BIG! I've seen plenty of grizzly's on logging roads on the mainland and they're not something you'd want to stumble across on a drunken stumble to take a leak while camping. There's a dead stuffed one (as opposed to the live stuffed ones ) at an outdoors store bout 3 hours north of me and it's shoulder comes up to my collarbone, and I'm 5'11". Mean mutha****as, Tim Treadwell must've had nards the size of my head.

If you enjoy this movie, go see if you can find a copy of Project Grizzly. It's about a man named troy hurtabise and his ever longing quest to build a grizzly proof suit. Good movie!