Brad Pitt loves a lone wolf character. Even in ensembles, he’s often the quiet one just to the left (but, you know, still the focus). The guy who sees everything and says little, drawing people, when there are any, into his orbit with sheer charisma. Small talk is for the strivers, not the stars, maybe?
He’s already done the space thing and the car thing. It was only a matter of time before this whittling away of excess would find him alone in the wilderness,
with only a dog as his companion, a German shepherd named Odin. No Manson followers to attack this time, though.
The film, in theaters Friday, is “Heart of the Beast,” which pairs him again with “Fury” director David Ayer. As is the law with dog movies, it is almost guaranteed to make you cry. And like many of Pitt’s characters that have come before, Army Special Forces veteran James Belmont is a capital M, manosphere Man. Not that he’d even know what the manosphere is, or a podcast. He’s far too manly for that.
James is a guy who doesn’t want, or need, any help from anyone. He’s got a compass tattoo on his neck, a paperback copy of Cormac McCarthy’s “The Road” in his bag, a notebook and a pencil for sketching, and a cooler full of bottled Belgian beers, neatly stacked around fresh ice. A beer opener, however? Not necessary for James. He’s got the side of his plastic cooler right there. When he has a brief encounter with another loner in the woods ( J.K. Simmons, resplendent in mountain man furs), James can’t even muster up the social niceties to unclench his rifle and shake the stranger's hand. He will, later, share one of his beers, however.
This little encounter helps set up a few things in Cameron Alexander’s script, allowing for some light exposition about how James and Odin, or Odie, are military veterans. James has 30 years under his belt, having served in Iraq and Afghanistan. Odie has the wounds to prove it, with a prosthetic leg and some titanium teeth. It also lays out that they’re in a very remote part of Alaska, where Simmons’ character has never seen another human, and that a big spring storm is coming.
Anyone who has seen the trailer knows that soon Odie and James will be without their already minimal creature comforts in just a matter of time and staring down a 58-mile (93-kilometer) hike through the wilderness in which they are both put through the wringer. And this is all AFTER a heart attack that results in his Cessna pontoon aircraft ending up at the bottom of a lake.
It is quite the white-knuckle journey through the wild with all sorts of challenges along the way. Stormy weather, bears, wolves, swamps that were supposed to be fields, slippery rocks and dangerous river crossings are all lurking. Even sleep has its perils: Nightmares of combat await both.
“Heart of the Beast,” it should be said, is not based on a true story. But it is a kind of ode to the resilience of veterans and combat dogs in a very flattering, superhero light. It never strays far from the formula, but while often predictable, occasionally implausible and sometimes even straight propaganda, it’s an effectively thrilling adventure and Pitt can shed a tear (actually, many) like the best of them. This might not be his most interesting outing as a performer, but it works on a primal level. And the movie is best when it’s at its simplest, showing the bond between Odin and James, and how worried they are about each other.
Four dogs, all in the same family, were used to compile Odin’s performance, but the bulk of it was done by a German shepherd named Uber. A little CGI was used in the process. And while the film definitely wants to make the audience sweat a bit, it also offers up a promise right at the start. Can the first scene in a movie be a spoiler? I think, technically, not, but if you’ve read this far you might also be looking for some reassurances. All I'll say is, don’t worry, this isn’t THAT kind of movie. But you probably already knew that.
“Heart of the Beast,” a Paramount Pictures release in theaters Friday, is rated PG-13 by the Motion Picture Association for “violence, peril, bloody/injury images and some language.” Running time: 101 minutes. Two and a half stars out of four.
