Disneynature’s Bears Movie Review

It’s not easy being a single mother with two little ones, especially if you are an Alaskan brown bear, that is.The new documentary, Disneynature’s Bears, shows its audience just how tough it really is the first year for Mama bear, Sky, to teach her cubs, Amber and Scout, survival in the Alaskan wilderness.

The movie explores the bears lives with breathtaking scenery in the wild and shows us just how close a bear family can be. The movie begins with Sky giving birth to her little cubs, to taking an adventure through the mountains where it is Sky’s responsibility to search for food for her babies and for herself. Alaskan brown bears feed on sedge grass during their trek through the mountains until they make it to the salmon runs where they can feast on up to 90 pounds of fish per day. That’s a boatload of fish.

The narrator, John C. Reilly, tells captivating facts throughout the film keeping the audience immersed in the risky every day life that the bears face. Sky has to be on the lookout for enemies at all times, enemies such as a hungry wolf named Tikanni and the alpha-male bears, Chinook and Magnus. It was sad to hear the facts that one in two cubs do not survive their first year.

I loved the cubs, Amber and Scout. It was fascinating to see their different personalities. Amber always seemed to be thinking things through ahead of the game while Scout was the adventurous one, always wandering away from his mom like a big shot.

The bears fighting scenes may be a bit extreme for younger children, however, there are several comical scenes that the whole family, kids and adults, will love. At the end of the movie, you will see the filmmakers with the animals and just how closely they worked with them – really amazing footage!

I adored this movie. While it made me tense in some scenes, it made me smile, and gave me a chuckle a time or two, and made me realize that even for an Alaskan brown mama bear, family is all that matters.