Memorable, crazy movie

Expected more

Excellent but underrated film

I really wanted to like this movie. I feel terribly cynical trashing it, and that's why I'm giving it a middling 5. Actually, I'm giving it a 5 because there were some superb performances.

Released in 1971, "Man in the Wilderness" stars Richard Harris as Zach Bass who's adventures are based on the real-life account of Hugh Glass, a man who survives a mauling by a grizzly bear and makes his way crawling and stumbling 200 miles to Fort Kiowa, in South Dakota, after being abandoned without supplies or weapons by fellow explorers and fur traders during General Ashley's expedition of 1823. Vengeful, Glass then sets out to confront his trapping partners who left him to die. Glass' story is also the basis of 2015's more popular "The Revenant." Whereas that movie was way more expensive and therefore has the better filmmaking, "Man in the Wilderness" has the better story. Zach Bass' long journey is one of discovery and possible redemption. As a child he experienced the life-stifling slap of legalism, which turned him off to God, but his sojourn, while harsh, is enlightening and conducive to grace. An Indian-birthing scene is a highlight while John Huston is notable as Captain Henry. This is a one-of-a-kind Western. The film runs 104 minutes and was shot in Arizona, Mexico and Spain.GRADE: B

This film is ostensibly about a man (Richard Harris) who is left for dead by the leader of his expedition into the Northwest Territory in early 1820. As other reviewers have pointed out, there actually was a man mauled by a grizzly who managed to survive in much the way that Richard Harris does in the film. In this respect, it is based upon a true story.This film actually has only three main characters: Zach Bass (Harris), the expedition leader (John Huston), and the Wilderness. The photography is stunning. And the Zach Bass theme is beautiful and haunting. The film is full of action and excitement, as revenge stories usually are. Bass survives by his courage, by his strength, and by resourcefulness.And on that basis alone, this film is an enjoyable movie experience.But this movie exists on an additional plane that moves it from being just a great action movie to instead being a great film.The movie it is most like is the John Wayne/John Ford film The Searchers. In that movie, John Wayne's search for his niece is actually his search for inner peace, which he finds by not seeking revenge but, instead, by finding his capacity for love and compassion.The "Wilderness" in this film is actually the wilderness in Zach Bass' mind--memories of a life full of regret and loss. As he works his way back to Huston to exact his revenge, he actually is working his way to a better mind, which by the end of the film is no longer a wilderness. It is, instead, a place of love, with, finally, clarity of purpose. The film is almost flawless in its execution. It is beautiful, moving, exciting, and touching. There is very little "dialogue" because the wilderness has its own richness of dialogue. Richard Harris is a fine actor. This is his best film, in my opinion.I first saw Man in the Wilderness almost 40 years ago. And I have allowed myself the pleasure of its company every few years since. And I will for many more years.

This movie depicts a true-life adventure and recounts the incredible, nay, fantastic story of famed mountain man Huge Glass, who in 1822 became part of a hundred man expedition originally led by general William Ashley to 'assend the great Missouri'. In the film " Man in The Wilderness " Richard Harris plays Zachary Bass, who is part of a scouting/hunting party for the over all expedition. Accompanying Bass are a young Jim Bridger and experienced hunter John Fitzgerald. Trailing an elk, Bass unfortunately surprises a mother Grizzly, who fearing for her cubs, attacks Bass who instinctual fires two shots at her. It then escalated into hand to hand combat with Bass stabbing her with several deep knife wounds before the bear succumbs and dies, but not before leaving Bass nearly dead and torn asunder in a bloody mess. Consequencly, the men who accompany Bass decide due to the sever loss of blood, gashes and deep wounds, is not expected to live and bury him in a shallow grave. John Huston is the expedition's Captain Filmore Henry, who makes the decision to leave Bass behind. Henry Wilcoxon is impressive as the Indian Chief and James Doohan (of star trek fame) plays Benoit. The harrowing challenge for Bass is remarkable as he struggles to get help from a frontier post in the dead of winter, nearly two hundred miles away. The movie is to say the least incredible, but being it's Richard Harris, we conclude his acting efforts have created a Classic. Well done! ****

**SPOILERS** Out hunting for food for the members of his expedition Indian scout Zachary Bass, Richard Harris,is suddenly attacked by a grizzly bear who savagely mauls him. Coming to Bass' rescue the frontiersmen of his expedition gun down the grizzly but not after the bear just about did Bass in.With both massive claw and bite wounds as well as having lost a near-fatal amount of blood it's decided by the leader of the expedition Captain Filmore Henry, John Huston, to give him a proper and Christian funeral but there's only one catch! Bass, as badly injured as he is, is still clinging on to life!With the two frontiersmen Fogarty & Lowire, Percy Herbert & Dennis Waterman, watching and waiting for Bass to finally kick off they turn tail and run at the sight of a group of Arikara Indians in the area leaving Zachary Bass to his fate. It turned out that Bass' fate was to survive and live to see his new born son whom at the time he never expected to live to see at all!Inspiring and touching story of how Zachary Bass defied the odds and survived in the bitter and frozen woodlands an mountains west of the Missouri River. Bass not a religious man who was very cynical of life-due to hie own life experiences-found a reservoir of new strength to help him struggle through life's hardships. Which turned out to be a combination of belief in himself as well as that of an Almighty omnipresent and benevolent higher power: God.Fighting off wolves and mountain lions for food in order to survive Bass soon becomes strong enough to make his way to the Missouri on foot just before Captain Henry's expedition. It's there that Bass finds himself in the middle of a life and death battle between Captain's Henry's men and hundreds of Arikara Indians lead by their chief Henry Wikoxon.***SPOILER ALERT*** With most of Captain Henry's men killed by the rampaging Arikara Indians and it looking like curtains for those still surviving another miracle, one of many, happens in the movie to have Chief Wikoxon call his warriors off. Chief Wikoxon's great respect for Bass whom, in what Bass went through, he considers to be one of his own.P.S The film "Man in the Wilderness" is actually based on a the true story of frontiersman and Indian scout Hugh Glass. Glass like Zachary Bass in the movie did survive a Grizzly attack and was left for dead by those in his expedition only to fool them surviving against impossible odds. Glass lived to be 53 years old, 13 years after that incident in the wild, only to be killed in 1833 together two fellow frontiersmen in an ambush by the Arikara Indians on the banks of the Yellowstone River.