The Bear (film)

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The Bear, known as L'Ours in its original French release, is a film directed by acclaimed French director Jean-Jacques Annaud released theatrically in 1988. The screenplay is by Gérard Brach and it was adapted from the novel The Grizzly King by American author and conservationist James Oliver Curwood. Fittingly, the movie carries this spirit by voicing conservationist themes.

The film is set in 19th century Canada. The main character is an orphaned bear cub who ends up befriending an older grizzly. The main action of the plot is driven by two hunters who are after the adult bear and the young bear cub gets caught in the middle.

The film is unique in the sense that the main characters are animals and the two human actors are for the most part merely supporting features in the film; dialogue is extremely limited. The strong points of the film are its outstanding cinematography and moving depiction of nature and animal interactions. It did not achieve much commercial success upon its North American release although it did better in France.

[edit] Story

In 19th century British Columbia, a grizzly bear cub named Youk hangs out with his beloved mother to look for honey. After digging in the rest of the honey by a tree, the mother bear ends up crushed by an avalance of rocks and Youk feels that he is on his own without his mother who is now dead. As he explores around the woods, the young cub met up with a grizzly bear who is shot by bear hunters on his shoulder and massacered one of their horses and wounds one of them. The more than 1,500-pound grizzly doesn't need Youk with him but when he stops at a lake to calm his wound down, the grizzly feels as Youk licks his wound to make him feel better and quickly became friends with them. As soon as possible, the two bears are still being stalked by hunters and they must find a way to escape them. Almost near the end, Youk is chased by a mountain lion but the cat-like predator is frightened off by the grizzly who came to save his friend.

At the end, the two friends hibernated as winter came and for Youk and the older male, they will be together as best friends since the greatest thrill is not to kill but to let live.