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I watched this documentary during a PBS fund raising drive and I was instantly pulled into this remarkable story of natural beauty, individual strength and intimidating isolation. Proeneke's homespun narration is amusingly engaging ("...it was time to go fishing...for I was fish hungry...tomorrow is Sunday...I will go someplace"). The incredible physical challenge of building a shelter virtually from scratch with hand tools forces one to think about the modern conveniences we take for granted. For example, Dick hand sawed every board for his cabin...that means each plank 5 feet in length required him to saw through 5 feet of solid wood 8-10 inches thick, a feat he modestly describes as "...15 minutes of sawing and I had myself a nice board...". I wondered throughout this film how many of the construction challenges I would not be able to surmount because of the physical stamina required in the hand work. The construction of the cabin fireplace from lake stone and sand is nothing short of remarkable keeping Dick's cabin a "balmy 40 degrees" in the dead of an Alaskan winter.

I found myself often asking why would someone want to do this? What part of modern society was so unappealing to him that he would want total isolation? Perhaps it was a combination of disgust for the rat race and Alaska's raw beauty that drew him to this remote place of natural wonder but I'm certain most of us would find the challenges he faced overwhelming regardless of the million dollar view from his cabin. A great documentary.

TAS does a descending ballet through the levels of Wildfire similar to the one we go on in Kubrick's 2001 during the Blue Danube...a journey designed to dazzle us with technical advancement and movie-making wizardry. Unfortunately, it has not stood the test of time. The annoying computer/human interfaces, the generated graphics, the construction and spaceship look of Wildfire, the technically advanced research facilities...none of them inspire awe the way the trip to Clavius still does in 2001. The "Big Brother/Nuclear Disaster" plot line is a little old these days. So is the conspiratorial background of Scoop and Wildfire being generated out of a desire to exploit space exploration and the associated research for the production of biog-weapons. Other than that, the movie is an engaging thriller and does draw you in. As biotechnology sci-fi horror goes, it's pretty accurate, not the disaster of other infectious agent threatening global disaster films like "Outbreak".