MAN IN THE WILDERNESS

UK/US, 1971, 105 minutes, Colour.
Richard Harris, John Huston, Dennis Waterman, Barton Mac Lane, Prunella Ransome.
Directed by Richard L. Sarafian.

Man In the Wilderness is another Richard Harris torture film (after A Man Called Horse). It is a Robinson Crusoe-type cinema poem about Man and his capacity to survive, The story is based on fact and is set in Missouri, 1820, and concerns a trapper mauled by a bear and left to die by his companions. The hero confronts his injuries, nature, Indians, his memories of his past and his desire for revenge in an epic of man's resilience and will to live.

Unfortunately, the ideas behind the film are better than its execution although there is much to admire, appreciate and, especially, to discuss.

Richard Harris does this kind of thing well. There is a characteristically individual performance by John Huston as Captain Henry. Other films by director Sarafian include Run Wild, Run Free, Fragment of Fear and Vanishing Point.

1. Did the title indicate that the film was about a man or about the human race? What images and emotions does the word 'wilderness' evoke?

2. The title of the film seems almost biblical with overtones of Adam, mankind, the human race, an individual representing mankind. Do you agree? Why?

3. Was the film primarily a Western? How much of a 'Western' was it?

4. How important was the evocation of the spirit of the West for this film - the wilderness environment, the isolation, distance, exploration, the trappers, Indians, giving birth, dying or being killed, animals mauling, survival? Did the camerawork and the quality of the colour photography help this?

5. Could the film be described accurately as a. 'cinema-poem'? If so, what made it a poem? How does this affect its impact on an audience and the type of response it draws?

6. How did Captain Henry, his top-hat, style, his art, contribute to the mood and meaning of the film? Would the film have made the same impact if Henry had been an ordinary trapper without the boat? Why?

7. How did the earliest sequences show the relationships in the trapping party? The young man's admiration of the hero? The hunting and knowledge of the wilderness?

8. What was the impact of the struggle between man and bear? What was the effect of the violence?

9. How strong a man was Zachary Bass? How did the subjective shots of our seeing through Bass 's semi-conscious eyes help us identify with him and his struggle for survival and life?

10. Had Captain Henry the right to decide that Bass should die? What was the most humane thing that he could do?

11. How did his being abandoned affect Bass? How much was he consumed by hatred and revenge? Did this help him survive?

12. How was the film a parallel to Robinson Crusoe? How well did Bass adopt to the wilderness? Why did he survive? What does this say about the resilience of man?

13. How did the Indians regard him? Did they admire him?

14. What were the dramatic effects of such sequences as Bass’s dragging himself to the water, competing with the wolves for meat, watching the Indian massacre, his taking the white man's supplies, his watching the silent Indian woman give birth, the change of the seasons, his pursuit of the trappers?

15. What did the film have to say about human suffering - its savagery, its challenge, its redeeming value?

16. How effective were the flashbacks? Did they fit in well with the structure of the film? How did their chronological order give a sense of development of character as well as meaning to Bass's experience?
- his reaction to his mother’s death
- his awareness of God, the harsh face of God the Creator
- his respect and love for his wife
- his awareness of the gift of life in his son in her womb
- his sorrow at her death
- his avoidance of responsibility and love for his son.

17. How did Bass's moving between Indian and white hostility show the futility of man's fighting against man?

18. How had the wilderness experience purged him of hatred and revenge?

19. How had the wilderness experience shown him the need for love and acceptance of life and responsibility?

20. Were you moved and/or convinced by the final sequences? What future was there for Bass?