Killing the Bear - Long Way Round (2004) Discussion

[–] April_Gary-Tomlinson 19 years ago

I have to agree with you royzkeano. It's almost like the pot calling the kettle black, isn't it?

The bit about 'money is no reason to kill' well, pissed me off a bit. Ewan doesn't know what lack of money might make a person do. And let's be thankful it's just a bear and not a human. But there is always two sides to everything and I, myself wouldn't kill an animal but given the sitution I totally understand the drivers and agree with Charley.

Bad art is more tragically beautiful than good art 'cause it documents human failure

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[–] StrangeMeeting 19 years ago

I actually side with ewan more over this, there really was no need to kill the bear, really. and the tree thing, well, its a tree, ewan was right there are a hundred million thousand of them in the world and they're not exactly in shortage. there are a lo9t less bears in the world than there are trees.

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[–] royzkeano 19 years ago

I take you point. In ideal world there would be no need to kill wild bears, or any wild animal for that matter, however I think Ewan failed to appreciate that these truck drivers don't earn a lot of money and they see the bear as an object to improve their way of living. This may be something a simple as being able to buy a tyre for the truck.

As for the trees- i bet you won't be saying that when the poles start to seriously melt because of the abundance of greenhouse gases, which trees do a steller job in reduce by releasing oxygen back in the air.

A bit deep i know, but i think it helps when we can appreciate our fellow man's situation.

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[–] StrangeMeeting 19 years ago

and its all ewan mcgregor's fault! xD

if we still had that one tree we'd be ok

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[–] royzkeano 19 years ago

I'm using that one particular example as something i couldn't quite get my head round as the two situations seemed to condradict themselves.

No one tree doesn't make the difference but if everyone went around chopping down trees, well (to use a brit term) it would us (the human race) right up the swannie.

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[–] 19 years ago

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[–] matineeidyll 16 years ago

I think he contradicted himself when he jumped from this to witnessing the slaughter of a goat in Long Way Down. I cannot watch that scene without: a) feeling sick, and b) wondering if Ewan had left his principles behind in England.

Go take a step outside - see what's shaking in the real world.

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[–] Arkrube 18 years ago

Ewan does justify his action in chopping down the tree in stating that "there are just so many"...could this not be the attitude of the Russian Lorry driver held regarding bears in Siberia?
Charley Boorman seems to have weighed the situation before he opens his mouth and does not appear to condemn the man for killing the bear for his pelt.
I am in agreement with your text regarding Ewan and his bear-n-tree statements; maybe, when coupled with his dialogue while in Alaska viewing the glacier it all comes together with his handgun/weapon commentary what his agenda/angle really is...

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[–] muffinprincess10 18 years ago

I think you'll find that Ewan's main problem was with them ONLY using the skin of the bear and leaving the rest of the animal there to rot, and I agree with him on this point. Fair enough if they had used the skin and then also taken the meat to eat or sell, but the fact is that it was a waste of an amazing animal just to use its skin. Also, I think he was ruled by his emotions slightly in that part, it was the very first time he'd seen a wild bear (apart from the polar bears in Churchill) and just a couple of minutes before he was marvelling at it, then suddenly, bam, it was dead, totally unexpected and probably a big shock to him.

Come and play with us in creepy eternity. Here you are loved.

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[–] jbone75 18 years ago

Ewan was not against killing the bear if it was used for food, a nessessity. The cutting down of the tree was a nessessity to get the trucks over the ditch, he wasn't uselessly cutting down the tree just to watch it fall. I think he would have seen that as useless, much like killing a bear. I don't see it as being against his earlier comments.

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[–] scot3121 18 years ago

jbone75----I like the way you put it.

It is obivous that Ewan loves animals, espcially wild animals, and it would be quite a shock to be seeing a beautiufl bear one minute. and have it,or one like it, killled the next.
Perhaps he doesn't understand or has forgotten that not everyone has a lot of money and sometimes one has to do this to get along in life.

I do think it is a shame that wild animals are shot for sport only.

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[–] muffinprincess10 18 years ago

But if they have so little money, why didn't they take the meat off the bear to sell or eat? I think that's the main problem he had with it, he kept saying it was a waste of a beautiful animal, just to take its skin. They obviously can't be that poor if they can leave all that meat to go to waste.

Come and play with us in creepy eternity. Here you are loved.

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[–] jbone75 18 years ago

Cause the bears in Russia are filled with mercury, the meat is poison. But bear gul, snout and paws are worth $1000's of dollars to some chinese cultures. Basically they were poaching. Its an infortunate thing, but I guess its what the people in those regions need to do to survive.

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[–] happy_apostate 18 years ago

I think this says it best:

Colonel Hugh Pickering: "Have you NO morals, man? "

Alfred P. Doolittle: "Nah. Nah, can't afford 'em, guv'nor. Neither could you, if you was as poor as me."

Ewan is rich and can afford a certain view of the world whereas the poor truck drivers skimp out a living in of of the most barren and hostile environments on the planet. The truck driver did not kill the bear for enjoyment, but to get whatever he could to sell to make money to feed his familiy. Survival in a harsh world is not a pretty picture.

Besides, Ewan eats meat for pleasure and he SMOKES! One man's pleasure is another man's greatest sin. Life is too short to look for self-righteous crusades.

---
A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence. - David Hume

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[–] roddyb 18 years ago

Good point. Animal rights fighters forgot that there are places on Earth where people live in poverty, while having a family and raising children with salaries as much as 100 bucks/mo. Ewan was driven by his emotions in this moment. Necessity drives him to axe a tree off his road, and Russians hunt because of necessity to feed their families. Let Ewan live with those people at least year, work with them as trucker in Siberia (with -50 in winter), eat, sleep, have fun as usual people around do, with money earned only by this job and then, lets listen to him again. You cannot judge these men, being a foreign millionaire having fun riding the bike.

Remember as Russian doctor said ? 'You all having fun here' or something like.

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[–] stmac10 18 years ago

I'm sure we all empathise with the truck driver who shot the bear to a certain degree...but from ewan mcgregors perspective, having only lived in scotland england and america, he's probably never witnessed desperation through poverty that you would see in the places they went through. The survival instinct that will be percieved as cruel, wasteful and brutal to most of us is obviously seen in a different light in some areas of the world...its not surprising that this had a profound affect on him, i would assume he'd never been desensitized to seeing acts of brutality on endangered animals. Boorman however...it says in the book that he says to vladimir or whatever his name was "you should have let me shoot it"...it just made me think a lot less of him...it wasnt just like charley was understanding of how the crippling economy puts pressure on people in those areas...but he was simply revelling in the hunting/shooting/killing of the bear cub.

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[–] bo_diddley 18 years ago

I just wondered why he didnt pay the driver not to shoot the bear. I usually don't believe any of the footage from these kinda "celebrety-adventures". It's entertainment only.
Watching the longbearded nature-boy/wildman Ewan McGregor is just hilarious. He's obviously pretty much bodyguarded and pampered by the others. Ewan M. or Charley says, "you should eat what you shoot."
Well..I guess that makes him either a vegan or a big game hunter back in London?
Standads are great, but doublestandards are twice as great, I guess.

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[–] mshawobx 15 years ago

he didn't do any complaining about the killing of the goat in goat polo. that was for sport! at least the bear offered a poor family an opportunity at earning some extra income to improve it's meager existence.

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[–] spacenk 18 years ago

i know i totally thought when he was harping on about it being wrong and just for money.."says the multi-millionaire!"

The brave may not live forever, but the cautious do not live at all...

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[–] thekillers89 17 years ago

The bear can feel the tree cant.

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[–] Miandyrr 17 years ago

I think everyone's taking the fact that Ewan is a big rich movie star into too much consideration. He doesn't like seeing animals killed - I'm sorry, who does? He was having a CONVERSATION that happened to be caught on tape... People have conversations every day with strong opinions that any person could analyze the way we are analyzing what he said. He doesn't go around campaigning against it, he was just TALKING.

Any other human being could say "I think it's wrong they killed it..." and their friends would say "well they need the money..." And it would just be a normal conversation about morality/necessity. ANYONE could/probably has said what Ewan said, it has nothing to do with how much more money he has than the average person - Anyone with a decent income would also not 'see it the way the driver saw it.'

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[–] 17 years ago

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[–] b2bjugsta 17 years ago

So did a bear tell you that or a tree?

I frankly don't care whether Ewan Mcgregor thinks its wrong to do this or that but his hipocrosy with the bear/tree thing was interesting.

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[–] Sonatine97 17 years ago

Interestingly in the sequel, Long Way Down, there is a scene where a goat is purposely killed for eating by the all the crew. The point is, however, before the goat was killed (sacrificed?) one of the crew actually showed to-camera they had plenty of rations and pre-packed food in store. So why was there need to kill the goat?

More importantly, in the context of this thread, Ewan didn't bat an eyelid when the goat was killed before his eyes, and soon tucked in to its roasted remains.

So Ewan needs to be careful before he gets on his soap box. If he was living in Russia as a lorry driver with a family to support and earning only a few roubles a month (as opposed to being a millionaire Hollywood film star), then I suspect shooting bears is a means to an end.

He also needs to think about the defintion of "killing for food". In fact they all do to be honest, Charley as well. Killing a goat for food when they had alternatives is just as "cruel & disgusting" as killing a bear for money

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[–] Glaramara 17 years ago

Blimey, there's some strange opinions in here. Meat is a natural part of the human diet, so killing something for food is just one of those things that happens. So what if they had alternative food? Where did that come from? This is all different from seeing a creature simply as a resource to be exploited, however much you need the money. I see nothing hypocritical in Ewan's position, and can't say anything against the lorry drivers shooting the bear, either.

As for trying to compare it with cutting a tree down, for heaven's sake. What next, saying someone is a hypocrite for mowing the lawn?

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[–] stormlord-2 16 years ago

I guess it's pretty easy for Ewen, a rich movie star to have a go at the dirt poor Russian who want to sell the fur to make a few extra dollars for their families. I hate hunting and don't like animals being killed in the wild but Ewan comes across as a bit of a rich pratt here.

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[–] Nikon11 16 years ago

He could've offered them whatever the going rate was for the bear-skin, for them to not kill it.

But he really can't expect them to have the same opinions and values as himself.

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[–] Hereafter 16 years ago

What disturbs me is, like any modern hunting, is the blurry line between a real human need and killing for fun and sport.
In the case of this bear, was it in reality just some spontaneous fun with a bonus payoff at the end?
I imagine by the types of trucks, these drivers would be at the high end of their profession and could not justify this act because they need money.
I was frustrated that there was no indication of how legal the practice was, or whether bears were rare or over populated
in the area.

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[–] ooze_ 15 years ago

I agree with you royzkeano. Ewan is a hypocrite and doesn't have a realistic view of how it is for local people without money.

I vote for the Russian truck driver.

An evildoer gives heed to false lips; a liar listens eagerly to a spiteful toung.

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[–] Darknessviking 11 years ago

i think its disgusting too what they did.

and i think that,it probably happened so fast,so nobody in the crew realized what was happening until it was too late.
i think that given a few more seconds,they might have maybe said that "no spare the bear,we give you 100 dollars when we get there instead"

it really bummed me out when that happened.. .

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[–] kmorrison1 10 years ago

"i think its disgusting too what they did. "

thats very easy for a 1st world resident to say, isn't it?

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