Thanks to its mixture of
gorgeous images of the American West and heartwarming themes, watching The Life and Times of Grizzly Adams is a
bit like living inside a John Denver song for 93 minutes, which is to say that
the movie conveys a deeply attractive vision of frontier life without the
burden of realism. Like the transcendent mountains in Denver’s songs, the
wilderness of The Life and Times of
Grizzly Adams is a place where Indians and wild animals are simply friends
whom the protagonist has not yet met, where every day is a new opportunity for
wholesome adventures in picturesque valleys, and where any sort of hardship can
be resolved in the space of a montage set to gentle music. This sort of
wish-fulfillment storytelling may be silly, but The Life of Times of Grizzly Adams meshed with the back-to-nature idealism
of the early ’70s. Produced for a reported $140,ooo, the independent feature
grossed a remarkable $65 million and spawned a TV series with the same star,
Dan Haggerty, which ran for two seasons.
Based upon the adventures of real-life
figure James Adams, who lived in the California wilderness during the 19th
century and demonstrated a remarkable facility for taming animals, including
grizzly bears, the movie was produced by Sunn Classic Pictures, a company primarily
known for its “pseudoscience” documentaries about the Bermuda Triangle,
Bigfoot, and the like. True to form, The
Life and Times of Grizzly Adams shamelessly blends fact and fiction. In
this telling, Adams (Haggerty) flees civilization when he’s accused of a crime
he did not commit, which never happened to the real Adams. The movie then
presents episodes depicting Adams’ assimilation into the mountain-man
lifestyle. He rescues a bear cub and names the cub Benjamin Franklin. He
rescues a wounded Crow warrior, Nakoma (Don Shanks), who teaches Adams survival
techniques. Adams endures a raft ride down whitewater rapids, escapes close
encounters with black bears and mountain lions, and so on. At various
intervals, the story stops dead for cutesy vignettes depicting animal behavior,
such as the amusing sequence of a raccoon trying to navigate a branch hanging
over a river. The whole piece is presented with wall-to-wall narration
delivered in folksy style by Bill Woodson, who also provides the speaking voice
that emanates from Haggerty’s mouth during the film’s few dialogue scenes.
In
terms of credibility and weight, The Life
and Times of Grizzly Adams is quite shoddy, basically the low-budget
equivalent of a Disney nature film. Nonetheless, the Utah locations are
spectacularly beautiful, and Haggerty cuts a believable figure with his massive
frame, flowing blond hair, and bushy beard. The filmmakers also cleverly frame
the piece with scenes about Adams’ feelings toward the daughter he left behind
when he ventured into the mountains, giving The
Life and Times of Grizzly Adams the illusion of being a properly structured
narrative.
The Life and Times of Grizzly Adams: FUNKY
