The Shepherd and the Bear review – Two endangered species scavenging to survive in the Pyrenees | film

THere are two endangered species native to the Pyrenees that are featured in this immersive and rather beautiful documentary filmed in Arièges, southwest France, by British director Max Keegan. The first is a brown bear, which was poached from the area in the early 2000s. Now the bears have returned, about 70 of them, thanks to the efforts of environmentalists with the support of the European Union. The film opens with footage of a 200kg helicopter delivery, in which a box is lowered onto a mountainside and a bear emerges thundering from it.

Airmail delivery is necessary because of local opposition — farmers are barricading roads, painting “No Bears” on the tarmac, saying bears are killing their livestock. Shepherd Yves, 63, with a flat cap and a cigarette dangling from his mouth, opposes bringing the bears back. He trains Lisa, a shepherd in her twenties, but their lifestyle is that of another endangered species, with few young people joining the industry.

At the local pub, an expert explains on television that 85% of a brown bear’s diet is vegetarian, with protein coming mostly from insects and other small creatures. “Bah!” said shepherds, who woke up to find their sheep half-eaten, and sometimes still breathing. Whichever side of the argument you instinctively find yourself on — team bear or team shepherd — the film resists snap judgments. Keegan filmed the footage over three years, and the locals clearly see him as part of the furniture and ignore the camera.

We hear a pro-bear commentator on television say that we humans must learn to live in harmony with the natural world. Tell that to the shepherds, who are always outdoors, with the changing mood of the seasons so stunningly captured by Keegan and co-director of photography Clement Beauvois. But then her budding wildlife photographer son takes a farmer to see a bear and his two cubs, and is amazed by their beauty. There are no easy answers here.