Grizzly Man (2005)

VERDICT:
8/10 Wild Boys

An incredibly candid look into an incredibly fascinating life.

Grizzly Man is a documentary about one Timothy Treadwell who up and decided to spend the last 13 Summers of his life hanging out with a population of grizzly bears in the Alaskan wilderness and capture everything on video before ultimately meeting his death at the hands of the wrong cub.

Yes, this is a true story and, yes, it’s totally crazy.

Going into this, I was skeptical because I didn’t really know what else it could have to say other than “Maybe it’s not such a good idea to go live with bears”, but lucky for me, this ended up being one of the more compelling character studies I’ve seen in a good long while. But that simple premise of guy-thinks-it’s-normal-to-live-with-bears has a real hook to it just on its own and you gotta wonder what the hell he was up to all that time. It’s a bittersweet movie in that, well, the guy dies, but he died doing the one thing in life he would die for and he got to spend freakin’ 13 years doing it before it all went downhill fast.

That’s more than most people who live with humans can say.

What I’m getting at is that this is a life that you’ve never seen before and Timothy Treadwell is the kind of guy that just draws you in. This is one of those “crazy until proven sane” scenarios where it’s easy as pie to read that synopsis and write him off as effing NUTS, but then you see him in front of the camera, you see how he truly cares about these animals, that he’s more at home shacking up next to a bear den than most people are under a roof and you start to think, “Okay, this guy’s crazy, but I’m starting to get it.”

Timothy is like a mix between Bear Grylls and Mr. Rogers. This guy has balls the size of a honeydew but talks about his life, his mission and his furry friends like he’s singing you a lullaby. He’s totally eccentric, he draws you in by just being himself and the best part is that you get to see everything that’s going through his head, especially the stuff that probably never would have made it into this movie had he been alive. It’s like having Timothy read you his life story straight out of his diary and considering how lonely it gets when all you’ve got to talk to is bears and foxes, he ends up talking a lot.

It’s also really interesting when he starts to talk about how he used to be an alcoholic, how he tried everything in the book to kick the bottle and the only thing that worked was chillin’ with the bears. Creates this amazing little give and take between Timothy and the company he chooses to keep.

The only issue I had with this movie was director Werner Herzog. Now, I’ve always gotten the impression that Herzog is one of these guys who knows he is hot shit, like molten lava hot, and if you don’t know that by now, then you, sir, are dirt. Instead of taking a back seat and letting Timothy and the people who knew him do the talking, he ends up making himself a main character by narrating his thoughts on everything that’s happening on-screen and even putting himself in front of the camera at times to stage totally fake, melodramatic moments with Timothy’s close friends.

Werner, man. Pipe down. This movie’s not about you. I do not care about your thoughts on Timmy. Please go back to your seat. Thank you.

But even with Werner at the forefront every now and again, it doesn’t prevent Timothy’s story from being anything less than captivating. Grizzly Man definitely adds a degree of credibility and understanding to a passion and a life that probably no one else out there will ever be able grasp first-hand. It’s not trying to make Timothy’s lifestyle seem normal, because, let’s be honest, bears are still terrifying beyond belief, but it sure is something else to watch from a distance.

Grizzly bears, man. Dwight Schrute ain’t kiddin’.