Month: March 2014

Okay.  It’s time to post another Amazon Review (just because I’ve been too busy working on my tax returns to spend too much time blogging).  This will fill the gap, till I can get back to some fun recreational writing again : )

Here’s my review of a favorite unique DVD, available from Amazon:  Alone in the Wilderness, Part II:

Love Wilderness Living? You’ve Got to Get This AND Part I

For the uninitiated few, I would suggest you get a copy of Alone in the Wilderness first, THEN watch this wonderful sequel. Although this film does successfully stand alone, Part I is just not to be missed, IMHO (In My Humble Opinion).

I first saw the original Alone in the Wilderness in 2005 on our local PBS station when my husband and I were living in the mountains (snowy, remote, and wild, like this movie’s setting). As soon as I realized Amazon carried the DVD, I got a copy. My husband has watched it repeatedly over the years; it’s one of his all-time favorite films. We just received Part II today & he’s seen it already. He likes it as much as the first one. Happy shopper : )

Alone in the Wilderness (and this, Alone in the Wilderness Part II), is a narrated videolog created by the team of Bob Swerer Jr and Sr, using film footage shot by the subject himself, Dick Proenneke. Proenneke moved into the wilds of Alaska and lived there, alone, for about 35 years. And unique for the time, he set up a camera on a tripod to film snippets of himself living life in the wilderness. Hunting, building a cabin, fishing, cooking, creating furniture, hammering out his own homemade cooking utensils, constructing cache buildings, collecting foods and berries, making homemade pancake syrup, making stew, sharing space with Grizzlies, baking sourdough biscuits–you name it, Dick Proenneke filmed it and wrote about it in his personal journal.

My understanding is that the Swerers took Proenneke’s journal entries and used them to write some very interesting and natural sounding scripted narration for the films (after what I am sure was years of film editing) and created a unique look at an Independent American living the frontier life, told in the first person.

These are REALLY, REALLY great films. They are not slick Hollywood productions–these are real moments filmed by a real person living a unique life that he notched out of the world with his very own hands.

You get to see him (in Part I) build his own cabin and then, here in Part II, you see wonderful additions to the original footage (building a cache for supplies, caribou, grizzlies, fishing, cooking frontier foods, flying with his brother in a bush plane, and lots more).

These are very unique films that appeal to the rugged individualist/adventurer in us all. If you loved Part I, you’ll love Part II. Highly recommended!