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Did Mike Fratello get bored?
Tune in to "Grizzly Man" on the discovery chanel saturday night at 7:00 pm (Texas time). They'll be showing it again on Sunday night. Not sure what time though.
It's a do entary about this California yahoo who decides to take his video camera to Alaska, and frolic with the wild Grizzly Bears. Apparently he did this for several years. The footage he recorded is outrageous. Footage leading right up to the day that one of the Bears decided he looked mighty tasty. This cat definitely experimented waaaay too much with LSD.
Too many commercials, but great TV.
Did Mike Fratello get bored?
You can raise them from cubs but you can't mess with full grown ones.
He watched way to many episodes of Grizzly Adams.
Plus no pepper spray. Very popular non lethal protection nowdays.
Bringing the girl was the dumbest part.
I read about this guy in Readers Digest a few months ago. What a dumbass.
We see the commercials for it all of the time thinking he was a total dumbass, but have never watched the show ... you mean a bear finally killed him??
You have no idea. Wait till you see some of the footage from his video camera. Dude was living way out on the edge. Getting close enough to some of these bears that he could touch them.
Dude liked bears.
Bears liked dude. . .with toast and jam.
I don't know if they play the tape in the do entary, but they played it on a different news show soon after he was killed, and that was pretty ugly. You hear him getting munched, and yelling at his girlfriend to run. She stays to try to get the bear away (you hear her hitting the bear on the head with what they determined later was an iron skillet). Then the bear kills and eats her, too.
Sad story.
This was at the theatre a few months ago. I missed it. Thanks for the update. Sad ending.
Last edited by Skywalker; 04-21-2007 at 07:20 AM.
I think you guys are way off base calling him a dumbass. He has a passion for being close to those bears and he knew the risks. I understand that many of you don't understand passion and love to live boring safe lives where the biggest risk you take is trying a differen't item off the value menu at Wendy's during your lunch hour but that doesn't make this guy a dumbass.
I've watched the show and I respect him quite a bit. He didn't want to live the life of an average American so he went out and pursued what he wanted to do. He did it for many years and he did it successfully. He made a mistake at the end staying too late in the year and it proved to be a fatal mistake, but he did things that no one else has done.
When interviewed about the film, a bunch of his friends said it wasn't a true portrayal of his personality in a way that made him see much farther from sanity than he ever was. I don't doubt that one bit.
That's a harsh way to go.
They didn't play the tape on the film. They showed Werner Herzog listening to it and he tells the owner (dude's close friend who hadn't heard it) to never listen to it and destroy it. Surprising move considering how misguided Herzog considered his view of the bears.
I wonder who leaked it -- someone at the ME's office?
Screwing around with huge wild carnivores like they're your friends definitely makes you a dumbass. Plain and simple. The writing was on the wall for this guy. It was bound to happen sooner or later. Only a dumbass would go to live with Grizzlies and "pretend" to be one.
I respect him as well. But on the flip-side, you can easily see that he was running away from the hardships of real life, and hiding in the wilderness of Alaska. It's also obvious that he was striving for that "rock star" status that's discussed in the do entary.
You see it as him wanting to live a different kind of life. I see it as a guy who was running away from alcoholism and drug addiction. There's no denying that he had that tree-hugging love of the wilderness, but a lot of his antics were obviously an attempt to put on a good show in front of the camera. Kinda makes me wonder what his true motives were.
Sorry, but the proof is in the pudding. After watching his own footage, there's no denying that this cat was a few McNuggets short of a happy meal. Not to say that he was totally crazy, but any man who gets that close to a Grizzly Bear isn't playing with full deck.When interviewed about the film, a bunch of his friends said it wasn't a true portrayal of his personality in a way that made him see much farther from sanity than he ever was. I don't doubt that one bit.
Oh, you've seen all of his footage right? Oh, you saw an edited FILM put together by a DIRECTOR who was trying to PAINT A PICTURE.
The people who knew him woudln't have informed opinions on his mental state, would they? No, you know better because you saw the EDITED FILM.
I gotcha.
The problem is that whenever people see other people doing somethign they don't understand, they automaticaly brand them as "crazy". People do things taht seem dangerous and strange to other people because thats what they love doing.
The man wasn't crazy. He knew the risks and decided the risk was worth taking because thats just how much he loved being there. You don't think that danger is worth it, so you simply call him crazy. And well, thats bull .
What a dumbass.
screwing around with full size bears, yeah I guess I don't understand wanting to do that.The problem is that whenever people see other people doing somethign they don't understand, they automaticaly brand them as "crazy
Its a freakin bear, thing can kill you in a heartbeat.
WTF would you want to with one!??!?!?
For the rush? Because he loved being around the bears? Because he loved the animals? Because he was fascinated by them?
Why do astronauts strap themselves to the top of a rocket? Why'd the Wright brothers get in a flying machine? Why do people try to break land speed records? Why do people do extreme sports? Why do people film animals very close in Africa? Why are their test pilots?
Like I said, passion is a thing many people equate with the movies and don't understand. Dude died doing what he loved to do. Thats more than I can say for a lot of people who die living ty unfullfilling lives.
Why call the guy a dumbass he's dead. If it weren't for guys like Timothy, we wouldn't have the Discovery channel, we wouldn't know about any animals.
He was doing it for yrs and caught some amazing video. Apparently the bear that killed him was not one of "his" bears.
On that note, a lot of people call professional storm chasers idiots. Yet we're all glued to the screen when it's tornado week in National Geographic Channel or something.
I probably feel for him because I had a nightmare about those ing bears last night after watching the video.
"I'm touching her pooh! It's still warm! I'm inside of her! I love her!"
Please, that dude was a fruitcake....either that or stoned out of his mind. I don't care what your passion is ... but if it involves trying to live amongst 10 ft grizzly bears, then, it's kind of hard to have a lot of sympathy when one finally gets your number. It's tragic that he died, no doubt...but I agree with the locals that have lived there for hundreds of years. He was doing something against the plan of nature and paid the price for it.
And what exactly was he doing to protect the bears, besides running around alone with camoflauge makeup on all by himself?
Last edited by SpursWoman; 02-26-2006 at 10:12 AM.
Yes, I think weathermen standing outside in 130mph hurricane force winds reporting the conditions are idiots and probably would feel the same way if they met their own demise by a flying Volkswagon.
Ah, but there's a difference between storm chasers in the midwest that do this type of thing for scientific purposes or some some dude that feeds his family that way, and Anderson Cooper standing in the middle of a hurricane year after year reminding us that a hurricane is "loud".
I watched the movie like many in here. As I watched it I kept seeing signs of obvious mental disabilities with it's host. Having passion is one thing, but he crossed the line that people who work or study animals must never cross. Not only that he broke more than one rule in the way he placed himself in the bears' enviroment. I honestly saw someone who used the bears for gain rather than actually benefiting them. He may have known the dangers, but maybe due to his state of mind, he was unable to clearly weigh them.
This was going to be my question exactly.
I didn't understand at all what he did to protect them. That was a major theme throughout the movie by him (and his friends in the ending). What exactly did he do to stop poaching? The only time I saw the bears in danger was when people were throwing rocks at them and he hid in the bushes and watched.
So, what did he do on a daily basis to help protect them?
His presence alone there apparently detered poachers. The year after his death there were (x number - I don't remember the exact number) of poaching incidents in that park.
As far as him seeming crazy, you're looking at a film put together by a director who wanted to make a point.
Question: You think the most entertaining scenes of video that Timothy shot are the ones where he's acting normal?
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