Review of Grizzly Man (2005) by Kok Hoong F — 30 Nov 2010

Somewhat exploitive I felt, but thoroughly engrossing and visually stunning. Having it done by Herzog adds a real tour de force to it as he sees the world in a totally opposite and negative way from the late and partially eaten Treadwell although he admits a certain admiration for the frequently maniacal and fearless fool of nature.

I want to sympathize with the clearly mad, probably bipolar Treadwell, but he really asked for his death, and the fact that he took Amie Huguenard, the really sad "invisible girl", with him is just very hard to swallow even if he apparently screamed at her to run away while he was being killed.

There's an audio tape of them being eaten that I don't want to hear, and the autopsy photos are I imagine equally gruesome. None of that will you see and hear in this documentary, and it's just as well.

The closest we get is seeing Herzog listen to it on headphones and beng clearly shaken. His own narration adds a lot to the whole documentary, and the interviews give all sides of it. In the end Treadwell accomplished what he set out to do, but at a terrible cost.