Nature isn’t cruel. Nature isn’t trying to kill you. Nature simply doesn’t care.
HEART OF THE BEAST — MORE THAN A SURVIVAL MOVIE
I went into Heart of the Beast expecting a good Brad Pitt adventure movie. And on that level, it absolutely delivers. It is fast, physical and almost relentless at times.
But I came out of the theater thinking about something much bigger.
At the center of the movie is the relationship between Special Forces veteran James Belmont and his combat dog, Odin. And for me, that is where the movie really lands.
We ask an incredible amount from military working dogs. We put them into helicopters, aircraft, gunfire, explosions and environments that no animal would ever choose to enter on its own. They go because we ask them to go, and because of the extraordinary bond that can develop between a human being and an animal.
There is a parallel there for me in the work we do with therapeutic horses. We ask a great deal of them, too, and sometimes we become so focused on what we want from the horse that we forget to ask what the experience means to them. We halter them, groom them, saddle them, ride them, direct them and put them back in the field, often assuming that because they complied, everything was fine.
But compliance is not necessarily the same thing as connection.
These animals are not equipment or therapeutic tools. They are participants in the relationship, and if we are going to ask them to help carry us through difficult places, we owe them the same attention, respect and consideration that we ask them to give us.
That relationship fascinated me throughout the movie.
Humans and dogs have been working together for thousands of years. We are both hunters. We are both predators. Somewhere deep in our history, two species discovered that each was better when working beside the other.
But I think the relationship eventually became something much deeper than simple survival.
Those of us who spend our lives around animals understand it.
We have a tendency to anthropomorphize animals, and we have to be careful about that. A dog is still a dog. A horse is still a horse. But that doesn’t mean the connection isn’t real.
Animals don’t particularly care about your résumé.
They don’t care how much money you have, what you do for a living, what mistakes you’ve made or whether the rest of the world thinks you’re important.
You can fail. You can be scared, exhausted or completely unsure of yourself.
And that animal can still decide to stand beside you.
There is something enormously powerful about that.
It is also one of the reasons we believe so strongly in the work we do at Veterans Equine Therapeutic Services. The animal doesn’t magically fix anyone. What they can do is create a relationship without many of the complications human beings bring into relationships.
Sometimes that gives someone enough room to begin finding themselves again.
THE OUTDOOR SCHOOL INSTRUCTOR IN ME WAS WATCHING TOO
Anyone who has participated in our V.E.T.S. Ruck Up or Outdoor School programs is going to recognize a surprising number of the skills being used throughout the movie.
Fire starting with ferro rods and strikers. Finding and processing tinder and kindling. Making feather sticks. Building shelter. Splinting injuries. Land navigation. Understanding your equipment.
And perhaps most importantly, understanding what is actually inside your pack and knowing how to use it.
There is certainly some Hollywood mixed into all of it, but a lot of the basic concepts hold up pretty well.
One of the things we try to teach in Outdoor School is that owning survival equipment and knowing how to survive are two very different things.
You can buy the greatest backpack in the world and fill it with every survival gadget Amazon sells. None of it means very much if you have never actually used those tools when you’re cold, wet, tired, hungry and frustrated.
And there is another piece of this that I think is important, especially for those of us who have served.
A lot of people leave the military and slowly stop doing the things that once kept them ready. They stop working out. They stop practicing basic fieldcraft. They stop carrying the right gear. They stop testing themselves physically. Skills that were once second nature begin to fade.
I understand why. You’re not in the business of war anymore.
But that doesn’t mean you should stop being in the business of being prepared.
Readiness is not just about combat. It is about being physically capable, mentally resilient and competent enough to take care of yourself and the people around you when things go wrong.
Nature will expose every weakness you have allowed yourself to ignore.
NATURE DOESN’T CARE
Nature isn’t cruel.
Nature isn’t trying to kill you.
Nature simply doesn’t care.
I think modern human beings sometimes forget that.
We experience nature through campgrounds, trails, parks, GPS, Gore-Tex, cell phones and vehicles parked somewhere nearby. We can easily convince ourselves that we’re pretty good outdoorsmen.
Take away those systems and things change very quickly.
Cold doesn’t care how tough you used to be.
Water doesn’t care what you did twenty years ago.
An injury doesn’t care about your plans.
Darkness comes whether you’re ready for it or not.
And somewhere farther up the food chain may be an animal that is dramatically better equipped for that environment than you are.
Heart of the Beast does a good job reminding us how thin the margin can become when human beings are placed back into genuinely wild country.
Even someone highly trained, physically capable and mentally tough can get overwhelmed very quickly when one bad event becomes two, then three, then five.
That is probably one of the most realistic lessons in the movie.
AND YES, IT’S STILL HOLLYWOOD
Brad Pitt gives a convincing performance as a Special Operations veteran, and I enjoyed watching the character use survival skills, improvisation, determination and that deeply ingrained military attitude of solving the next problem and continuing to move.
There are definitely moments when you have to remind yourself that you’re watching a movie.
At various points his ability to absorb injury, get back up and continue moving begins to approach the superhuman.
But I’m willing to forgive some of that.
It’s an adventure movie. It is supposed to entertain us, and it does.
But underneath all the action, I think there is a surprisingly thoughtful movie about trauma, resilience, survival and the relationship between human beings and animals.
For me, especially, it felt like a love letter to working animals — and to combat dogs in particular.
It reminded me why the relationships we build with horses, dogs and other animals can become so important.
Sometimes an animal doesn’t need you to explain what happened.
They don’t need you to justify who you were.
They don’t even need you to tell them who you’re trying to become.
They just stand beside you.
And sometimes that’s enough to begin the journey.
Overall, I really enjoyed Heart of the Beast. It’s exciting, emotional and occasionally larger than life, but there’s quite a bit underneath the surface if you’re willing to look for it.
If anyone else has seen the movie, I’d really love to hear what you thought about it as well. Drop your thoughts in the comments — especially if you saw something in the story that landed differently for you.
— Thor Torgersen
Co-Founder / Executive Director
Veterans Equine Therapeutic Services
VETSUSA.org