Grizzly Man

***Possible Spoilers*** "Grizzly Man" is a documentary of Tim Treadwell who spends 13 summers in Alaska living amongst grizzly bears and eventually loses his life to the creatures to which he devoted all his heart.

I saw "Grizzly Man" without knowing anything about it. I first thought it would be a documentary about the beauty and behavior of grizzly bears. However, through Tim Treadwell's interaction with grizzly bears, Werner Herzog shows that this film is actually about the inadequacies and insecurities of human nature.

Tim Treadwell seems to be the culmination of many of the deficiencies that man possesses. I felt absolutely no sympathy for this individual, despite the fact that he suffered a tragic and horrible death. If it weren't bears that killed him, it probably would've been something else. He was definitely headed toward a downward spiral. I felt like he was a man who ran away from his demons because he could not face or overcome it. He developed high "ideals" and when he could not adjust his values and beliefs to that of society, he abandoned it and sought out for acceptance from creatures that are incapable of judging or criticizing Treadwell. Unfortunately, Treadwell mistakes the grizzly bears' indifference or incompetence as a sign of acceptance, and falls in love with them.

Treadwell displayed behavior suggestive of manic depressive disorder, or cyclothymic disorder, or histrionic personality disorder. His emotional reactions to incidents were over dramatic to the point that one questions whether it's genuine. I also thought that he was a closet homosexual who could not accept his sexual orientation. In the film, Treadwell talks about wishing he were gay because it would be easier, but he denies being gay. He also talks about how he has trouble with keeping relationships with girls. I know this is a big assumption, but I couldn't help but question whether he was running away from civilization hoping he didn't have to face the reality of his sexual orientation. Treadwell is a person who does not know himself, and is afraid to find out.

I also did not like the fact that Treadwell was on this unsubstantiated high horse. This self-proclaimed protector of animals and nature displays his hypocrisy in at least 2 scenes. When Treadwell stumbles upon poachers who throw rocks at a baby cub, all he does is hide behind a bush and criticizes the hunters for hurting the bear. Not quite what a "protector" would do. Also, when Treadwell discovers the dead fox, he gets angry for the destruction and death that exists in this world. However, he doesn't blink twice to try to swap a fly that is buzzing around the fox. Obviously he shows no respect for the fly, which is also a living organism.

Also, throughout the film, most of Treadwell's friends glorify all that he represented. It seems that his death has elevated him to a martyr, and I found that inappropriate. I don't believe one's achievements in life should be overblown and exaggerated because he or she suffered a tragic and violent death. Based on Treadwell's self-recordings, I find that he has done nothing to deserve any praise. The way he died is sad, but that should not have any bearing on what he did in life. If anything, Treadwell encroached upon the grizzly bears' territory, and abused their independence and way of life in order to hide behind the mask of his own demons. I find nothing altruistic about his actions because of that.

In the film, Herzog says that death and destruction is a unavoidable reality of nature, and he has done a brilliant job in portraying that. My take home message was that everything bad in this world exists because man is too weak and feeble-minded to transcend beyond our natural tendencies to destroy his surroundings and to self-destruct. And Treadwell is the perfect example. Great job Mr. Herzog.

Anyone who has followed the trajectory of Werner Herzog from the time of "Even Dwarfs Started Small" will understand the immediate appeal that the Treadwell story must have had for this intensely brilliant German director. Treadwell must have seemed to Herzog like a Laguna Beach version of his Fitzcarraldo and his Aguirre and even of Herzog himself in his more unhinged moments. This film appears at first to be a fair minded documentary about Tim Treadwell, the 'protector' of all things natural and wild in the remote regions of Alaska. What Herzog shows us, however, is that what Treadwell really needed protection from was reality itself and that his escape into the wilds was just a deadly game of denial.

The film is also a meditation on the brute force of nature, on art and on human hubris. My wife found the 'character' of Tim Treadwell so ludicrous and offensive that she had to leave the theater. For my part, I was in awe of both Treadwell's incredible physical courage coupled with his absolute lack of judgment and his insane narcissism. He struck me as a cross between Pee-Wee Herman and Marlon Perkins, the guy who narrated the Mutual of Omaha nature documentaries that showed up on Sunday afternoons in the 60's and 70's.

The word is that Hollywood, in the person of Leonardo DiCaprio, was a financial supporter of Treadwell's 'mission'in Alaska and that a Hollywood version of the story is due out sometime soon with Di Caprio playing the lead. I know I won't be going to see that version because it will just continue the lie and the myth that Treadwell tried so hard to create and sustain. Even at his most intense moments of profoundity Treadwell had nothing to 'say' to anyone about either bears or himself. It was all self-serving and self-congratulatory and it is only in his grotesque death at the hands of a rogue grizzly that any meaningful message finally comes across. (Herzog thankfully spares us from the actual experience which was caught on audio but not on video because the lens cap had been left on.)

Its hard not to feel sorry for Tim Treadwell and the young woman who died with him, but the 'native' scientist in the film put it quite nicely "My people have been living nicely with bears for thousands of years and we know enough to stay out of each other's way."

Tim Treadwell wanted desperately to cross the boundary into the 'way' of the bear because the 'way of the human' was too much for him. Despite his goofy, childish demeanor he revealed himself to be a man of deep anger and resentment. However, if the bears had let him live he would probably be considered something of a folk-hero in 'reality' obsessed America.

Herzog shows us that there was nothing real about Treadwell at all and that the bears knew a lot more about him than he ever would of them.

I have so far resisted peer pressure to watch more than the first episodes of Tiger King, but I can still say with confidence that Grizzly Man is vastly superior.

It's truly incredible the amount of empathy Herzog is able to generate for such a misguided, kooky person. It's all the more impressive to see the contrast between Timothy Treadwell's sentimentalized view of nature with Herzog's (and my, for that matter) view that nature is indifferent and chaotic. To mix these two contrasting philosophies with what are, in some sense, two different films--Treadwell's footage and Herzog's narration and interviews--make for something truly moving and insightful.

Herzog's "Grizzly Man" is a miraculous documentary. He started by collecting hundreds of hours of video tape shot by the movie's subject, Timothy Treadwell. The director then culls through the footage and assembles a fascinating portrait of this uniquely bold (and clearly troubled) human being: Treadwell spent 13 summers living amongst grizzly bears in the wilds of Alaska, before being killed by one in the summer of 2003.

Treadwell's footage is gorgeous, and at times heart-stopping: a grizzly battle caught on tape is the stuff Animal Planet would kill for. But the footage goes beyond simply revealing the harsh yet beautiful reality of the Alaskan wilderness. The camera soon becomes a silent confidant to Treadwell's self-obsessed confessions. For one, he sees himself as the singular savior of the wildlife preserve he camps at and the creatures that reside there. But he also sees himself becoming increasingly less connected to the real world he lives in 9 months out of the year. The footage here is most poignant, revealing Treadwell's inner struggles. It paints a picture of a lonely man searching, perhaps desperately, for purpose in a world he feels has rejected him. Most eerily prescient are Treadwell's repeated remarks about how he would die for the bears, though his eventual death does not appear to be the martyrdom he so clearly sought.

This is where the film is most riveting - in Treadwell's footage, focused on the man, the bears, and the force of nature around them. Less compelling are Herzog's talking head interviews with Treadwell's friends and family - although they do help to solve (as much as possible) the puzzle of where Timothy came from, what lead him to the bears, and why he was killed.

It would not be a Herzog film with the director's own philosophical palette framing the story. Herzog's commentary reveals his longstanding view that nature is cruel and that chaos is the constant in our life experience, not harmony. That Treadwell saw beauty and soul in the bears seems to be beside the point, since ultimately their need for sustenance made them turn on their self-appointed protector.

Warner Herzog is a brilliant and masterful director. The way he put together the story of Tim Treadwell and his life with grizzly's defies the constructs of formulaic "nature" doc's. It goes deep, as we are allowed to dive into the mind and psyche's of both Treadwell and Herzog as Treadwell's fated story is revealed to us through bits of the 100 hours of footage Treadwell left behind, new interviews, insights, and a brilliant and personal narrative done by Herzog himself.

As Herzog gets to know Treadwell through his footage and loved ones left behind, he is touched, changed, and allows the audience to revel in his new found awe, frustrations, and respect for Treadwell's life.

The film documents the life of "the Girzzly Man" timothy Treadwell through his leftover footage from thirteen summers he lived with, and immersed himself into the grizzly habitat and culture. He felt he was a grizzly, and thus broke boundaries that have been respected among the Alaskan natives concerning these brown beasts. He created what he felt to be a bond, a brotherhood with these majestic animals. But was this conquest purely for scientific reasoning or was he truly terrified of the "human world." That is where Herzog directs this film.

The fascinating thing about Herzog's interviews is what he catches after his participants are done answering his questions, and we see these souls search and ponder for answers to questions they may never know the answer too.

"Grizzly Man" won the Alfred P. Sloan award at this years Sundance film festival, which goes to the film felt to tie in science and discovery into normal narrative paradigm. This film deserved it's praise and was thusly purchased for theatrical release by Lions Gate before it's release on television through Discovery films.

When you get the chance, don't just run to your local theater or television to view this masterpiece, leap and sprint. This is an important and beautiful piece, one that will touch and move all those who allow it to. This is the best of the fest in my opinion, and maybe even of the year, and it is only January.