Brother of the Bear

Huntley Gordon stars as a bad-tempered lumber mill foreman who is in love with the mill owner's daughter (Mary Astor). But the owner (Charles Slattery) would rather have his daughter marry a rich man (Bradley Barker). Gordon gets fired after he berates his workers and then starts a fight with his rival after forged papers are found that show he's been cheating the boss.

Meanwhile, bad-tempered Gordon has taken in an escaped trained bear named Bill. Alone in his cabin in the woods, he starts to learn the ways of the bear and nature and gains control of his temper. When Astor goes for a canoe ride to see Gordon, her father and suitor race through the woods to head her off, but she gets there first. At the camp Gordon sets the bear after the men, chasing the father up a tree while Gordon shoves the rival in the river. With the bear terrorizing the men, the rival admits the papers were forged. The bear saves the day.

In a comic subplot, a prissy tourist (played by Fred Bond) also has a run in with the bear.

Shot around Augusta, Maine, there are some terrific shots of the logging mills along the Kennebec River and the long-gone Belgrade Hotel in Belgrade, Maine, which burned to the ground in the 1950s.

Huntley Gordon has a pet bear and a bad temper. The latter gets him fired from his job at the lumberyard, that and the accusation he's been stealing lumber and selling it to the competitors. this means he's not only out of a job, but out his girl: Mary Astor, the owner's daughter. So he punches Bradley Barker, the guy who forged the damning documents, which dumps him in the river.

It would be an utterly forgettable back-woods movie, except that it seems to be Miss Astor's first film appearance. She looks pretty good, and even manages a couple of poses that will become her standard, casual look. Mostly though, this movie is most interesting because it raises a question: can a silent film accompanist see a shot of a tame bear and not quote "The Teddy Bear's Picnic"? Apparently not.