"The Bear" & "The Bee Movie"

"The Bear" is a movie that I had no idea about. I'd never heard of it before. JP owns it be default. It's part of one of those box sets you can buy. He'd bought the set for the movie "Watership Down" and at the same time became the loving owner of "The Bear" and "The BFG" (which is coming up after "The Bee Movie".) Based on it's pack mates I assumed this was going to be some kind of sweet children's movie about bears.

Before I say much else about this I'll tell you that I watched this on a Saturday night when I was feeling rather unwell and tired. So probably not the best time to be watching this kind of thing.

The movie takes place in British Columbia in 1885. It's about a bear cub that is orphaned and finds an old grizzly bear that has been shot by hunters to befriend. The hunters chase the bears around the woods and the bears keep getting away until the cub is captured by the hunters. The grizzly corners one of the hunters up on a high mountain top and just when you think he's going to eat him, he walks away. This leads to the hunter letting the bears get away and everyone seems to live happily ever after.

What's amazing about this movie is that it's all filmed with live animals. It looks like it was shot by people filming real life animals in thier habitat. If it were not for the disclaimer at the beginning of the movie advising that the scences where animals were injured were simulated I'd probably not believe it was filmed to a script at all. The movie follows the various animals (but mainly the bear cub) around the woods for the majority of the film and really shows the uninterrupted nature that exists out there.

The other thing that I really liked was that there wasn't a lot of talking. In fact there are no people in the movie until about 10 minutes in and even then there's no dialogue until 17 minutes in. There are only three men the entire film and they only have a handful of lines all together.

Personally I'm not to good with the gory bits - mainly the shooting of the bear, the defleshing of bears, injured horses and dogs, and even the scene where the bear cub licks the bullet wound of the grizzly. Euw. If those bits had made the editing floor I'd have been much happier.

I'm divided on whether I'd consider this is really a children's film and whether I'd recommend that children watch it. On one hand the natural environment and the animals is awesome and I think children these days don't get to see that as much as they should. Also, there's no fake voices, it's all completely natural, so it's not trying fooling children into thinking that they are some magical animal that talks like in so many movies you see today. On the other hand though I have the whole hunting, shooting, bullets and blood flying everywhere thing that I don't think children really need to see.

Perhaps I was not in the right frame of mind last night because I wasn't definetly firmly on the 'No way is my kid ever watching that' hand, but 24 hours later, I'm feeling better and swaying towards the other hand, and perhaps thinking that sometimes we need to expose our kids to this kind of 'violence' so that they gain a more realistic view of the world. If we're watching it with them so that they can ask questions etc, that can't be a bad thing.

Oh who knows, I'm obviously conflicted and not likely to make a proper decision until one day in the distant future and my kids say "Can we watch Uncle JP's "The Bear" movie Mum?"

This afternoon it has been pouring with rain, cold and miserable. JP and I went to the supermarket, stocked up on beer and junk food and came home to plop ourselves down in front of the heater and have us some good old fashioned movie watching.

The next movie in the project was "The Bee Movie" and JP hates it. I find this rather amusing to be honest. He tells me it's because they are talking bees, that talk to humans and then sue them. It makes no sense. My response to that? It's an animated children's movie, if it was all real where would the fun be?! I keep coming up with movies that are similar (as in movies where animals talk to humans) and seeing if he hates them too, but no, apparently it's just "The Bee Movie".

I do conceed that I am not the hugest fan of "The Bee Movie". It's a Dreamworks production and those that have read my previous reviews will know that I'm a Pixar girl any day. Dreamworks is a distant second in my opinion.

Anyway, "The Bee Movie" is written, directed, produced and stars Jerry Sienfeld. So if you're not a Jerry fan this isn't the movie for you. It's about Barry B Benson, a Bee that has just finished college and must decide which job to take in the Honey factory in the hive. Only, Barry is more interested in what's outside the hive and takes a flight to find out. While out he gets stuck in the rain and must take shelter inside a humans house. He's rescued from a good old swatting by Vanessa (a human) and they strike up a friendship. When Barry accompanys Vanessa to the supermarket he discovers that humans are using all the honey the bees make without their permission. He sues the honey makers and wins. Now the bees have more honey than they no what to do with so they stop making their own honey. This of course means no more pollen collecting or spreading as they don't need it for their honey. Slowly all the flowers and trees start dying and Barry realises that Bees are needed for a lot more than making their own honey. So he and Vanessa steal a flower float from the tournament of roses festival and fly it back home. All the bees are called in to help land the plane when Barry accidently knocks out the pilots. Once the plane is laned all the bees take off with the flowers and start pollenating again. Everything goes back to normal - hooray.

I hear you already, JP is mildly right - the story is ludicrious. Not only do they talk, but they sue humans, land a plane and save the world just by pollenating flowers.

What I do like is that it's an animated movie, and like "The Ant Bully" and "Antz" it goes inside a world that we don't know much about and brings it to life. It has a great cast - Matthew Broderick, Renee Zellwegger and Patrick Warburton. I could take of leave Jerry Seinfeld as an actor, but as a Comedian I think he's great.

This one is definetly for the kids. But once is more than enough for the adults.

Next: "The BFG" and then "Big Fish".