Bears
Since
Earth Day is just a couple days away that means it is time for
Disney’s annual celebration of nature, or, as their accountants
refer to it, our Annual Tax Write Off … because we ‘re
kinda doing it for charity.
After exploring the lives of Chimpanzees, African Cats and everything
in the ocean, Disneynature and acclaimed documentarians Alastair
Fothergill and Keith Scholey give us a year in the life of Bears as the
movie tries to mix in traditional nature film storytelling with Disney
storytelling, which can yield mixed results at times.
In Bears, Fothergill and Scholey immaculately capture the
beauty and danger of this Alaskan wilderness as they follow a first
time mother bear and her two new born cubs in the first year of their
lives trudging through the mountains, grazing in the fields, fishing
for salmon in the river and doing everything possible to avoid wolves
and other bears that have ill intentions towards our little cubbies.
When focused on that nature, Bears is breathtaking. These are
filmmakers who know how to capture the utterly magnificent beauty of
this far away world that feels untouched by human hands. It’s a
paradise on film and might prompt you to take one of those Alaskan
cruises.
However, they also want to make Bears a touchy feely cutesy
movie that often eschews the idea that you might learn something for
the hope that you will experience some emotion, whether it be fake or
genuine.
Motivations, explanations and personalities are all assigned to the
bears and other animals to make them more human and give the whole year
one simple story with a beginning, middle and end complete with
villains, heroism and a big climactic finale. This isn’t a Pixar
movie about bears. It’s a little too simplistic for the reality
we are supposed to be seeing.
Even narrator John C. Reilly gets in on the act as he provides dialogue
for the bears, which just doesn’t fit the seriousness the whole
movie started with. Bears opens like some great educational adventure,
but quickly gives in to sentimentality and cheap theatrics better
designed to sell some plush, stuffed cub dolls for the little kiddies.
Bears can be a joy for the whole family, but
don’t expect to walk away with any new knowledge, just some
easygoing mutually agreed upon fuzziness.
Bears is rated G.
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