Entertainment from the Wild

The cold weather refused to leave this week, so once again I will not be going hiking. Instead I decided I would review some books and shows that are about the wilderness.

Television

While most of my time spent in front of the TV might be watching I Love New York I still happen to land on the Discovery Channel or National Geographic Channel every once in a while. Last year I discovered the show Man vs. Wild. It features British survival expert, Bear Grylls, who is dropped into a remote landscape where he must survive with very little until he finds civilization. I thought this show was sweet and that Bear was awesome. Well imagine how shocked I was when this summer I discovered through the magic of YouTube that Bear was a fake. The following video is what I found.



In addition to what is shown on this video Bear has also been reported to have stayed in hotels while filming his show. After watching this video I found another that featured Les Stroud who also had a survivalist show, this one was called Survivorman.(WARNING: Part of this video is kind of gross)



After seeing this video I made it a point to watch Survivorman and to never watch Man vs. Wild again. Les Stroud is the real thing, at least it seems that way. His survival tips seem like they could really save your life if you were lost in the wilderness.

Books

This quarter I took an Environmentalism in America course, in it we read five books that were about the American Environmentalism movement. Some of the books were interesting, and some less interesting. My favorite of the books we read was The Monkey Wrench Gang by Edward Abbey. It is a story of a group of environmental radicals who take it upon themselves to save the American Southwest from being spoiled by development and pollution. The characters in this book are crazy but likable. A film based on the movie is set to be released in 2008 and it seems rather promising. According to my Environmentalism professor rumors were that Jack Nicholson and Matthew McConaughey were set to be part of the cast.


Another book from the class was Lost Mountain by Erik Reece. This book introduced me to the horrors of mountain top mining, before this book I had never heard of this practice. It is when coal companies blow off the tops of mountains in Appalachia in order to get to the valuable coal below the surface. The environmental effects of doing this are numerous. In the book Reece spends a year watching and visiting the ironically named Lost Mountain until it truly is lost forever.



Movies

If you have not seen the film Grizzly Man then I strongly suggest you do so. This is one of my favorite movies, it is a documentary by German director Werner Herzog about the life and death of Timothy Treadwell. Treadwell was a bear enthusiast who spent 13 summers in the wilderness of Alaska living with grizzly bears.On his 13th summer in Alaska Treadwell and his girlfriend were killed by one of his beloved grizzly bears. The film combines footage that Treadwell shot of his summers as well as interviews with those that knew him to tell a very interesting tale.

I need to see the movie Into the Wild soon. It is a film about a young mans journey around Americas wilderness. Many friends and family of mine have seen this movie and have given it great reviews, hopefully it will live up to its hype.

When it is as cold out as it is sometimes it is nicer to enjoy the wildnerness from the comfort of your own couch.