Hair of the Bear: Trudeau and McLellan's Winter Thriller Pulls Punches But Eventually Lands One

By Jim Slotek

Rating: B

The dead-of-winter thriller Hair of the Bear, Alexandre Trudeau’s first non-documentary feature, co-directed with his friend, high school teacher James McLellan, obviously has a lot riding on it for both filmmakers.

And surprisingly, given that both are ex-military men, and Trudeau has spent a career running towards danger in war zones, Hair of the Bear is rife with promise but pulls its punches, maybe too carefully.

Malia Baker and Roy Dupuis have a date with fate on a frozen lake

Set against the desolate frozen lakes of Southeastern Manitoba (I couldn’t help thinking at least there are no mosquitos that time of year), Hair of the Bear taps into some well-used tropes in horror-thrillers, notably the cabin-in-the-woods visited by sketchy strangers, and a teenage girl who is forced to seek a way to turn the tables when things turn violent.

In this case, the protagonist is a severely anxiety-prone teen. Malia Baker plays Tory, who is sent to spend time with her grandfather Ben (Roy Dupuis) in his remote cabin, there to learn wilderness skills and receive a steady stream of encouragement. Only a few hints are dropped about her issues. She is being driven by her mom when she should be in school, and there is a quick glimpse of scars on her wrist.

The vagueness is deliberate, a nod to an earnest teacher’s desire to acknowledge that there is no one cause of crippling anxiety. But really, it would be okay to use one. There is also virtually no swearing, except for one dropped F-bomb at the end, when it becomes more PG-13..

The teaching moments (learning how to snowmobile, how to set up a lean-to and make fire, etc.) take up the first third of the movie. The changes of mood seem awkward, especially when it goes so abruptly from what could be an after-school special to a last act with a level of violence that seems to come from an entirely different film.

Still, Baker and Dupuis work well together, given the amount of rushed screen-time their relationship has to develop from silent-and-sullen to trusting.

Hair of the Bear moves into more familiar mode when Tory and Ben encounter two strangers stranded on the lake, one of them nearly dead from exposure after falling into the water. Their appearance is telegraphed by Ben’s comment that he has a gun because some people come over the border via the frozen lake and they’re not all nice. Yes, some of the dialogue is a little on-the-nose.

Brothers Sam (Robert Naylor) and Miles (Jonathan Lawrence) have up-to-no-good written all over them, although as is often the set-up with dual criminals, one (Miles) is a follower. A captive Tory’s attempts to get inside their heads is the movie’s best opportunity to raise the level of storytelling, and it does for a bit.

To say Tory overcomes her anxiety and becomes a proactive revenge-taker is no spoiler. There are “beats” the story could use to make the storytelling smoother. But, given that this is Trudeau and McLellan’s first time doing this, they have managed to create a workable revenge story that gets you to the “revenge” part with only a few distractions.

CLICK HERE to read Jim Slotek’s interview with directors Alexandre Trudeau and James McLellan.

Hair of the Bear. Written and directed by Alexandre Trudeau and James McLellan. Stars Malia Baker, Roy Dupuis, Robert Naylor and Jonathan Lawrence. Opens in theatres Friday, March 6.