Grizzly Man Part 2

I sat myself down this evening and watched a DVD, something I should do more of. This time out it was Grizzly Man, Werner Herzog’s documentary about the life and death of Timothy Treadwell.

As good ol’ Werner said to me just the other day, I was going into this film with hardly any expectations, and that’s a good thing. I’d heard Ebert and Roeper’s review, so I knew the gist – a young guy who’s been living among wild grizzly bears in Alaska for 13 summers is found dead, mauled to death by one of the bears. But man, nothing can prepare you for this film! The opening shot is of a bear in a gorgeous field. Timothy, narrating and starring in his own video footage enters the frame and starts talking to the camera about his wilderness philosophy, how he is a silent warrior. It’s hard to make up your mind about this guy. He looks like a surfer dude, talks like a kook, and yet has amazing footage of these animals and him amongst them.

Treadwell would arrange to be flown in by bush plane to a remote lake in Katmai National Park each spring, and remain there for the entire summer when he’d be flown out again. He saw himself as a protector and advocate of these bears that are under threat by illegal poachers. He was also an educator. He would speak to elementary classrooms about bears and their threatened habitats. He had such a child-like quality to him that I’m sure made him a great spokesman in front of children. He was also fearless, some would say naïvely so.

The film doesn’t hide the fact that Treadwell was killed by a bear. Early on in the film we learn of his death. The rest of the movie is devoted to who this guy was, what drove him into the wilderness, and why after so many years of apparent peaceful coexistence, did the bears suddenly turn on him.

One of the most chilling and powerful moments in this (or any) documentary is when we learn that Treadwell, who videoed everything, actually caught his own death on tape. We see a coroner explaining what happened, and how he had heard the audio tape of the attack. The more the coroner talks, the more I began wondering if they were going to show this footage. When the bear began to attack Treadwell he had time to turn his camera on but not remove the lens cap. Apparently there’s 6 or 7 minutes of audio of this deadly attack on both Treadwell and his girlfriend who also died. I was thinking Herzog would do what Michael Moore had done in Fahrenheit 911 when he opened his film with the chilling audio of the 9/11 attacks. But to Herzog’s credit, he doesn’t ever use this filmmakers gold. We only hear about it. There’s a scene of Herzog listening on headphones to the attack as Treadwell’s ex-girlfriend sits by. Herzog describes briefly what he’s hearing, but then grows silent. After a moment he begins to cry. To not hear what’s on the tape, to not be able to witness Treadwell’s final moments, we are left imagining, and it’s one of the most powerful moments I’ve seen in a film.

There’s something pretty damn primordial about being eaten by a bear. It reminds me of a story about a Greenland Eskimo shaman, Autdaruta, who gained power by allowing himself to be repeatedly devoured by a bear. There’s legitimate questions to consider as to whether Treadwell had a death wish, if he wanted to be devoured. The film interviews various residents of Alaska as well as bear experts, family members and friends, and the range of opinions about Treadwell is fascinating. Some think he was crazy and had it coming. Others saw him as a gentle educator who’s luck ran out. The film lets all these voices have their say, and I’m left at the end wondering myself what to think.

It so clearly reminded me of Jon Krakauer’s Into the Wild, also a story of a young man’s death in Alaska. The story of Chris McCandless also raised a deafening chorus of opinion. Why do people venture into the wilderness? What are they searching for? What are they running from? Why such aggressive reactions when people end up dead? And why are these stories so gripping to those of us who remain behind?

At the very least there’s some weird consolation in knowing that there’s still wild places on the map. Not every corner of this continent has been paved. There’s still places where you can get yourself killed.

Personally I think Treadwell was a bit of a nutcase who was skating on thin ice. He was no shaman. He was obviously unbalanced, but still, his story has that fascination that draws me in. He was living his life the way he wanted. He found something out there that connected him to things he was unable to connect to elsewhere. But so often, these dreams prove to be unsustainable. Maybe that’s why I find these stories so tragic, they seem to be about Innocence squashed. It’s not just the loss of life, people are killed ever year in Alaska in one way or another, but both Treadwell and Chris McCandless (and countless others before them and since) were searching for a purity and authenticity not found in our modern world, and to that I can relate. It’s not just another death. It’s the death of an idea; Innocence and ideals not found, illusions that needs to be shattered. Still, I can’t help but mourn for this loss of purity, no matter how misguided.

Timothy Treadwell is gone. We’re left with his (and Herzog’s) amazing footage of a truly wild place. And as long as there’s Wild out there, there will be the Call.