Grizzly Man
Time for some more procrastination. I really should be transcribing. Werner Herzog’s "Grizzly Man" is definitely one of the more engaging films I’ve seen this year and one of the reasons I love it is for its conflicting, but somehow seemless mixing of tones. Someone recently said to me that the narration of the film was "occasionally" ridiculous. I thought, "Occasionally???" Herzog’s narration is the dictionary definition of pretentious, overblown and laughably melodramatic and then all of a sudden it turns deep and profound, and i think that’s one of the amazing things about the movie. It just brings unexpected levels of absurdity in the oddest places. There’s moments where just pure ridiculousness is flush right up against totally illuminating moments and it’s so surreal that it just mindboggles. So strange and beautiful.
If you’ve been living under a rock, it’s a film about wannabee bearologist Timothy Treadwell, who stays each summer with Grizzly Bears in Alaska for about 15 years, if I recall correctly. For the last 6 years of his adventures Treadwell, documents his interactions with the bears with his hi-definition digital camera ostensibly making some docufilm about his role as protector of the Alaskan wilderness and these gigantic bears. Eventually the dumbass gets eaten. He’s sweet, naive, absurd, seemingly gay, painfully sincere and ridiculous. You can’t take your eyes off him though. His artless idealism about the bears and Alaska is amusing, pathetic and admirable, all at once. He’s this wonderful ball of contradictions and the films travels in all these kind of mixed emotions - unitentionally of course, but that’s besides the point.
Without giving away too much, the part where the coroner gets overexcited about re-telling the bear autopsy story to the camera while Herzog is zooming in comedically for some dramatic effect is so uncomfortable and so fucking ridiculous i was virtually on the edge of tears and thinking, "this is so wrong, this is so beautiful."
I love those uncomfortable moments in life and movies cause you just can’t really script them, they’re so priceless. It’s an odd, but great movie and you torn between pity and admiration for the filmmakers and main subject - i love that dichotomy. Although he might seem like an unsmiling German, I’m sure Herzog actually possesses a sense of humor and yes, i’m sure, at times, he’s subtley mocking Treadwell as much as he finds him loveable and estimable, but for the most part, I think Herzog is dead-serious.
i doubt this type of endorsement will compell anyone to see the film, but yeah, do it , it’s wonderfully ridic.
