Man attempting to surmount nature, and failing miserably, has long been an obsession of German filmmaker/documentarian Werner Herzog -- his work during the 70's most ardently dealt with that. In his latest effort, Grizzly Man, Herzog has found a way to retread the concept through Timothy Treadwell, a man who spent 13 summers in the Alaskan nature preserve, often breaking laws in order to get closer to the grizzly bears he apparently cared for. The documentary consists of excerpts from the over 100 hours of footage Treadwell mostly shot himself over the course of 5 summers before him and his girlfriend, Amie Huguenard, were killed by one of the bears in October, 2003. 

Early on in the film, its hard not to sympathize with Treadwell and his passion, but slowly and surely, it becomes apparent that he wanted recognition (not fame, necessarily). Its obvious to me that his accomplishment led him to believe that hes superior to other humans in a way ("You wont @#%$ survive here like I did," he once says looking directly into the camera), something he always aimed for, rather than it allowed him to strive to "become a bear," which is what we hear from various "professionals."

Having said that, we need to be careful regarding making an ultimate judgment. After all, Herzog has given us only a few minutes of, as I mentioned earlier, over 100 hours of footage. What we watched fitted well with Herzogs overall agenda. Its quite possible that if another documentarian wouldve taken on the subject, wed be discussing something different. Still, in this doc, which is overall well put together, Herzogs shouldve dug deeper into Treadwells contentious relationship with Huguenard, which we discovered through his diary entries. The bear who killed them (and then later got shot) was provided more attention than the girl.

And Herzogs penchant for details of their gory deaths was primarily incorporated in order to go around what he didnt wanted to do: let us hear the audio tape. I have mixed feeling on that. Is it more "noble" to have an overly excited forensic-embalmer(?) explain how the bear tore into Treadwells skull, or would Herzog have been able to make his obvious point by employing an artistic means? I recall Mexican director Alejandro Gonzlez Irritus mastery of sound editing in the anthology titled 11'09''01 - September 11 (2002) in which his segment simply consisted of screams of people jumping from the buildings after the attack. It was a moving and devastating account and not simply a technical showcase. But if Herzog was going to stay away from the sounds, then he shouldnt have tried to recreate a scene where he listens to the tape and then informs Treadwells former girlfriend to throw it away. It teases us more than anything else. Not good.

However, what follows is the films most astonishing and, to some, possibly disturbing scene: Two bears fight it out for the "Michelle Pfeiffer of bears," as Treadwell later notes. Herzog rightfully remains quiet during the sequence, which culminates with his protagonist recognizing the laws of nature while sitting not far away for the fallen bear. This is where Treadwell feels like a human being, one whos brave enough to be right there. (He also spoke about the possibility of his death on numerous occasions; practically he knew that his end would be through the animals he loved most.)

The filmmakers best moments, however, do comprise of his commentary, at times running along Treadwells. Herzog doesnt allow us to make a connection between his subject here and his "favorite" actor Klaus Kinski -- he makes it himself: "[Treadwell]s rage is almost incandescent, artistic. The actor in his film has taken over from the filmmaker. I have seen this madness before on the film set." This was after Treadwells profanity-laden rant against the Alaskan park services. (The disappointing part is that the bears were doing perfectly fine. There are many, many other species out there that couldve used him.) And then later on, its Treadwell who provides him with the close-up of a bears face, making Herzog conclude that "in all the faces of all the bears that Treadwell ever filmed, I discover no kinship, no understanding, no mercy. I see only the overwhelming indifference of nature."

Nature is cruel. Most of us recognize that, I think. But its also beautiful and majestic. While the focus here is certainly on the former, Herzog duly notes that Treadwells images, unwittingly, often consisted of the lush green hills and valleys in the region, not to mention the rivers and the lakes that surrounded them. But ultimately the filmmaker believes that the common denominator here is not harmony, but chaos, hostility, and murder. Looking at the direction we seem to be headed in, he just might be right.