Redford film presents new view of animals

Press, 25 May 1977, Page 28

Redford film presents new view of animals

By

JOAN HANAUER,

of

United Press International (through NZPA) New York. It sounds like something out of a movie — the handsome Robert Redfordstyle hero building his home in the wilderness, sleeping on the ground, and watching the animals peacefully pursue their ways. But the scene was real, and so was Redford, and it was this experience that led the actor into what has become a major interest — conservation. And that led him to narrate a fascinating hourlong wildlife special. “The Predators,” for N.B.C. “I used to hunt — I was an avid hunter and fisherman,” Redford said in an interview. "Then in 1962 I was building our home in the mountains. We were 40 miles from anywhere. sleeping in sleeping bags. I saw a lot of animals and I watched deer feed, and other animals pursue their course in nature.” That made a difference, and so did having children, which fostered “a different emotional attitude.” “I lost interest in hunting for sport,” he said, although he is not opposed to all hunting as are some conservationists. But what makes “the predators” special enough to attract a superstar of Redfords stature? The programme was filmed over a period of three year -and a half in 25 states by a trio of unknowns — the producer, Marty Stouffer, and his brother, Mark, with the aid of Marty’s wife, Brenda. Redford, in jeans and boots, looking more relaxed and less intense than on the screen, said that he had been following Stouffer’s work for some years, impressed with its quality and hoping they

could work together professionally. The key was the underlying theme — that if you disturb the cycles of nature you are asking for trouble that your technologv likely cannot solve. Man 'each year destroys more predators, endangering even those species that will do him little harm. “Maybe its time we stop,” Redford said. “Otherwise we might mess up in 25 years what it took nature a million years of well-proven experience to create.” Redford and the Stouffers are trying to present the predators as they are — not as man’s mythology has recreated them. They and their prey are neither good nor bad — each exists because of the other.

When man kills off predators, more often than not their prey multiplies until man must step in and himself become the predator.

The predators the Stouffers filmed ranged from the tiny shrew that weighs one-fourteenth of an ounce to the Alaskan brown bear — even though at least half the bear’s diet is vegetable rather than animal. But society tends to think in stereotypes, with the predators the bad guys and their prey the good guys. As Redford and the Stouffers pointed out, it is easy to get votes for the Easter Bunny, but in a Disney film the predator comes on the scene with bad-guy music. The Stouffers grew up in Fort Smith, Arkansas, with a series of pets ranging from a poodle to a beaver named Stanley. The family also loved to take home movies. Put the two together, and you have a career.

They have the patience of the true animal-

watcher, ready to sit for hours on end, week after week, in order to train their cameras on a particular animal or bird in a singular situation. It is this quality that attracted Redford, he said, plus what he considers the really important message of presenting predators in their true light. “A predator is an animal who has to kill to eat,” Marty says in defining his subject. “That goes from the smallest predators, which are insects, to the largest, the blue whale. We confined our film to terrestial mammals. mainly from North America and primarily from the United States.” Mark Stouffer said that “predators are what frighten man most and what are most misundestood. “The stereotype is that the animal that kills is bad, the animal that gets killed is good,” Mark said. “But really they live in mutual dependency, predator and prey.” In looking at the predator, one point that is underscored — in nature the hunter does not always land his prey. More often than not, it gets away. At the end of “The Predators,” as Redford is winding up the narration, a predator does what comes naturally — picks off a less than fit prey animal for food. The Stouffers had to convince Redford that, if their film were successful, by that time the audience could watch a predator act as nature intended without flinching. Does Redford plan to do more such television films? “No,” he said. ‘“lf I spread myself too thin I get labelled as the guy who does all that nature stuff, the guy who doesn’t want to cut down any trees.”