How did they train the bears and panthers to act on command?
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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — The Bear
WWu777 — 14 years ago(February 11, 2012 11:21 AM)
How did they train the bears and panthers in this movie to act on command? I didn't know that was possible, especially with a bear cub.
How did they get the bear to limp like it was injured after it was shot? I thought bears were untrainable?
How can you make bears and mountain lions growl menacingly on command too?
Also, do you think that bear would have spared that hunter who shot it like that, at the end, in real life? It reminds me of the ending in Free Willy 3.
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lubin-freddy — 14 years ago(February 23, 2012 05:46 AM)
Much of the story was put together by creatively editing hours and hours of film. It's the same technique that's used in nature documentaries, where we're lead to believe that THAT eagle in the sky has its eyes on THIS field mouse.
And, I love the film.
I want to shake every limb in the Garden of Eden
and make every lover the love of my life -
noonan_p — 14 years ago(March 07, 2012 11:21 AM)
Actually, if you read the credits the adult male bear is named "Bart the Bear," and is a tamed Grizzly/Brown bear with quite a list of film credits; he died in 2000 at the age of 23. You can check out his "page" on Wikipedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bart_the_Bear
Any young animal can be trained to do just about anything resembling normal animal behavior, as long as the trainer is patient and consistent with a reward system. As for making the animal growl or snarl on command, I have trained two of my own dogs to bark and growl using a very subliminal hand command. I can hold my hand by my side while talking to another person, give the hand cue and my dog will start barking until I tell him otherwise.
It's come in handy with annoying people knocking at the door - "Sorry, I have to go, my dog is getting really upset."
In real life, it's doubtful a wounded bear would spare his attacker since typical bear behavior is to fight its attacker. But since this IS a movie and the animals were trained "actors," anything is possible.