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Grizzly Man

Grizzly Man (2005)

tomatometer

93

Average Rating: 8/10
Reviews Counted: 134
Fresh: 125 | Rotten: 9

Whatever opinion you come to have of the obsessive Treadwell, Herzog has once again found a fascinating subject.

100

Average Rating: 8.3/10
Critic Reviews: 35
Fresh: 35 | Rotten: 0

Whatever opinion you come to have of the obsessive Treadwell, Herzog has once again found a fascinating subject.

audience

82

liked it
Average Rating: 3.6/5
User Ratings: 50,228

My Rating

Movie Info

Filmmaker Werner Herzog adds another real-life character to his growing pantheon of people who walk a fine line between visionary genius and madness in this documentary. Timothy Treadwell was a self-styled authority on bears who, starting in 1990, would spend as much time as possible each year in Alaska, camping out near a grizzly bear habitat. While Treadwell claimed to love the bears and felt as one with them, he had no formal training in their behavior, and while familiarizing himself with

R, 1 hr. 40 min.

Documentary

Dec 26, 2005

$2.9M

Lions Gate Releasing

All Critics (138) | Top Critics (36) | Fresh (130) | Rotten (9) | DVD (14)

Like so much of Herzog's work, both narrative and documentary, this is an engrossing look at obsessive behavior gone terribly awry.

April 29, 2008 Full Review Source: Chicago Reader | Comment
Chicago Reader
Top Critic IconTop Critic

An alternately gripping and funny-charming nature film and psychological study.

October 7, 2005 Full Review Source: Orlando Sentinel | Comment
Orlando Sentinel
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[Treadwell] left behind 100 hours of some of the most astonishing nature footage ever captured by camera.

September 30, 2005 Full Review Source: Toronto Star | Comment
Toronto Star
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Compelling, disturbing documentary.

September 30, 2005 Full Review Source: Globe and Mail | Comment
Globe and Mail
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It's an uncompromising character study of a man who found peace, and ultimately death, among some of the most dangerous predators on the planet.

August 25, 2005 Full Review Source: Arizona Republic | Comment
Arizona Republic
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What makes Grizzly Man remarkable are the edited tapes that at first seem to show a man at peace among nature, and then later reveal the startlingly fragile state of that man's mind and persona.

August 19, 2005 Comment
Detroit News
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Werner Herzog forgoes judging Timothy Treadwell's disputed methods or questionable mental state - letting viewers decide based on footage that suggests Treadwell essentially sought some sort of transmutation from flesh to fur.

September 25, 2010 Full Review Source: Suite101.com | Comment
Suite101.com

Remarkable beauty and wonder

September 5, 2009 Full Review Source: CinePassion | Comment
CinePassion

This documentary is excellent, but not meant for children.

July 16, 2008 Full Review Source: Common Sense Media | Comment
Common Sense Media

Amazingly, while being interviewed, Herzog is shot in the belly by a passer-by with an air rifle... and so the director's personal myth as an intrepid outsider is perpetuated.

September 25, 2007 Full Review Source: Film4 | Comment

Treadwell, a failed TV actor, is presented as someone desperate to give and receive love. That he went to such extremes is tragic, but also, in Herzog's sympathetic eyes, deeply human.

August 16, 2007 Full Review Source: Time Out New York | Comment
Time Out New York

As a character critique it is hardly a mauling, for Herzog is too sophisticated a thinker, too respectful towards his subject, and altogether too humane to tear Treadwell apart for a second time.

July 6, 2007 Full Review Source: Eye for Film | Comment
Eye for Film

An amazing, provocative and ultimately creepy film.

March 1, 2007 Full Review Source: Film Journal International | Comment
Film Journal International

chilling

August 24, 2006 Full Review Source: Cinema Writer | Comment
Cinema Writer

Uma das maiores obras-primas da carreira de um cineasta que vem conquistando, ao longo dos últimos 44 anos, um lugar mais do que merecido entre os ícones da Sétima Arte.

June 5, 2006 Comment
Cinema em Cena

After having gorged on nonfiction films that tell us what to think, Werner Herzog's Grizzly Man is an improbable palate cleanser, allowing us to not know what to think and encouraging us to admit as much.

May 12, 2006 Full Review Source: Sacramento News & Review | Comment
Sacramento News & Review

Part punk wildlife doc, part diary of a twisted soul, part cautionary tale, Grizzly Man is a complex, unique and engrossing journey into the murky recesses of an unhinged mind.

April 1, 2006 Full Review Source: Empire Magazine | Comments (3)
Empire Magazine
More Critic Reviews

Audience Reviews for Grizzly Man

An immediately captivating premise is elevated by Werner Herzog's perfect pacing and elegant editing, and the undeniably beautiful yet eerie, tragically ironic footage taken by Timothy Treadwell, the man who lived for 13 summers with grizzly bears before being eaten by one in 2003. The clearly troubled, possibly insane

March 18, 2012
Sam Barnett

Super Reviewer

"For once there is weakness they will exploit it, they will take me out, they will decapitate me, they will chop me into bits and pieces. I'm dead. But so far, I persevere. Persevere."A devastating and heartrending take on grizzly bear activists Timothy Treadwell and Amie Huguenard, who were killed in October

April 4, 2009
LorenzoVonMatterhorn
Lorenzo von Matterhorn

Super Reviewer

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