- They would've been better off just stabilizing the injury,
not getting out the big old machete, getting out the ax.
I think if I saw that girl charging at me
after I'd got my leg caught somewhere,
I'd be going, "Uh-uh, put it down. We're going to plan B."
Hey, I'm Bear Grylls and I'm back again to review
some classic survival movies
and see how viable they really are.
[logo chirping]
So, this clip is from the film Those Who Wish Me Dead.
These guys trying to survive a forest fire.
[fire roaring]
I think first thing that jumps out
is that forest fires are incredibly dangerous,
incredibly powerful.
These guys are really in a high, high danger zone.
Forest fires can reach over 1500 degrees.
So, that is a crazy heat.
One thing they're doing maybe a little wrong on this
in the sense, even though listen, they're in literally
the heat of the moment, but they're running directly
away from the fire.
You know, if you're running downwind,
you're never gonna be able to outrun it.
You really should be trying to run across the fire
to get out of the path of the forest fire.
They're doing right in the sense they're going downhill.
You know, the heat is always gonna be wanting to go up.
The other good thing about going downhill,
is that you stand the best chance of finding a stream
and a stream's obviously gonna lead to a, you know,
a river or a lake or a pond.
That's gonna be one of your best ways of staying safe.
- Listen to me, take a deep breath, hold it and lay back.
Watch what I do. [inhales loudly]
- The reason people often die is a lack of oxygen.
You know, there's only so long people can stay underwater.
You know, fire sucks oxygen out of the environment.
So, that is one of the real dangers for these guys
'cause I think that's probably pretty unrealistic.
The reality is, you know, A, you're not gonna be able
to hold your breath for long under that water.
Every time you come up, if you are in the heat of the fire,
there's gonna be no oxygen.
The heat's gonna be overwhelming
and ultimately you're unlikely to survive that.
[theatrical music]
In the classic film, The Revenant, this guy has to cauterize
a wound, a big neck wound, with gun powder.
[water rushing]
So, obviously Leo is in a tricky spot at this point,
he's got an open neck wound.
Obviously there is a lot of blood flow in your neck.
If this was a, you know, on his hand or on the leg,
there'd be an argument just to stabilize it
and do compression on it.
The amount of blood loss he would experience
with a neck wound,
you're into the territory of like, ugh,
cauterize it with gun powder isn't really great,
but it might be the least worst option at this stage.
You're, you know, if you're gonna die anyway,
you're gonna get to the stage of trying anything.
[flesh sizzles] [man cries out]
What would've been the reality is that most people
with that sort of wound would be dying anyway.
So, cauterizing probably works some of the time
and that's probably why they did it.
But it's a true in-extremist option,
gun powder's gonna create super hot,
it's gonna seal off those arterial and veinal bleeding.
And then you've gotta keep that wound clean
and try and protect it.
But as we know from this one,
he's already in a bad situation,
he's into the reserve tank and it just might save his life.
Yeah, I would give him a good chance actually,
above all what he does have is courage,
a fighting spirit and a never give up kind of,
come on, we're gonna do this.
So, in the game of survival, that is king.
[theatrical music]
In this scene from The Shallows,
she's been bitten by a shark.
She's trying to deal with the wound as best she can.
[water lapping]
What she's trying to prevent is, is massive,
massive blood loss from that shark bite,
which is right and which is smart,
but she'd probably be better off in truth,
doing it mainly through compression.
You know, she uses some jewelry to suture,
to sew it up, which is actually smart.
I mean, I remember once in the military,
seeing one of a soldier I was alongside,
we were parachuting in North Africa at night.
He landed on a rock, cut his leg really badly open.
And I saw him just, just there to there,
Rambo-style sew up that wound.
But what he had that this lady didn't have
is strong antibiotics and to be able to stop infection,
'cause really in the wild, it's infection
and historically it was infection that often killed people.
I think the hard thing in this situation
is gonna be the pain level.
You know, she's obviously doing it
without anesthetic to be able to do that
to yourself is hard.
But again, you know, survival, the rewards that go
in survival to those who can do the unimaginable
and can overcome that pain and that fear barrier.
She's obviously made a stern staff, she's doing it,
but there's also a power to adrenaline in disaster moments.
And if you can harness that and use that,
for most people, adrenaline becomes overwhelming
and they panic, that's why it becomes so frantic.
But if you can harness that adrenaline
to allow you to overcome the pain and act quickly,
that adrenaline can really help her in this moment.
[theatrical music]
In this clip from Yellowjackets,
it gets ugly with some amputation on the cards.
[unsettling vocalizing]
[girls screaming]
Yeah, so this is a pretty gruesome scene.
You know, sometimes you gotta act fast
in the heat of the moment, but you gotta make sure
your actions are actually gonna help the person,
rather than potentially kill them.
I think just making a split second decision
to use the ax, cut off the person's leg,
is maybe jumping to some hasty conclusions.
Really they've done the hard work,
which is getting the injured person out from
under that wing, the leg is obviously broken,
but once that leg and that person is away from the danger,
really the focus wants to be on just stabilizing them,
potentially resetting that leg and then protecting it,
you know, just hacking into it is gonna create
huge open wounds and opens up a whole can of worms.
Often, literally, you know, if these guys haven't
got antibiotics, you're gonna get septic probably
out there pretty fast and blood sepsis kills very fast.
So hacking with a ax, wouldn't be number one on the agenda.
If though, you can't get the body out from underneath
and you've got another threat coming along
and you've got no option apart from hacking off a leg,
if you had to do it, where you want to tourniquet first,
then you need to cut.
Then you've gotta get through bone, which is harder
than it sounds, often involves initially breaking the bone
before then cutting through it.
And then you've still got a massive,
especially with a leg, massive open wound,
really without proper equipment.
And antibiotics is kind of, almost a death sentence.
But you know, again, you're in an extreme situation.
If you gotta do it, you gotta do it.
But really looking at this clip,
they would've been better off just stabilizing the injury,
keeping the person calm, keeping fluids going into them,
not getting out the big old machete,
getting out the ax.
[theatrical music]
TV show, The Wilds and one of these girls get stuck
in quick sand. - What the fuck
is taking me down? - [Girl] Here.
Rachel, calm down!
- Quicksand is obviously dangerous.
People often wonder if it actually exists,
of which the answer is yes, I've been caught
in quicksand a few times.
So it is very hard to recognize when
you are often approaching this stuff.
I've had it many times as you've been walking,
looks like really solid and then suddenly I've
just disappeared.
- Get off!
Get off, I got it! - Help!
- [Girl 2] You're making it worse!
- Help!
- The number one rule of quicksand is turn around
and get out the way where you know solid ground
is behind you, the way you went in.
Second golden rule is not to panic.
You know, the more you panic, the more your limbs get pulled
down and what happens then, you get fatigued.
And then once you run out of energy, you know,
you're often really then sunk into it
and that's where people start breathing
in the water and obviously die.
So, like me so much the survival number one, don't panic,
keep calm, turn around, go back out the way you came
and don't fight it.
- Listen to me, you have to stop.
Okay? Shh. Stop fighting.
- Try and get a limb one at a time, legs, arms,
onto the surface, spread your weight,
wriggle a bit like a seal, but never fight it.
You know, sometimes you just get caught in this stuff,
but the key is staying calm, knowing your routines,
knowing your protocols of how to get out of there.
And if you're with a buddy, get them a rope,
get that under them to give them a leverage
to get their their body up and then use that to help again,
spread your weight as you move forward.
But like so much of the wild and so much of survival,
you gotta be resourceful and also calm in the big moments.
[theatrical music]
This clip is from The Mountain Between Us,
where Kate Winslet goes through the ice of a frozen lake.
[snow swooshes]
- Ben?
[ice cracks]
So, frozen lakes are obviously incredibly dangerous
in the wild, many people still every year, fall through ice.
You know, then you're in a real, genuine,
life survival situation.
As you see with Kate, when she goes in,
that immediate gasp and panic and they actually call
it the gasp reflex, where just in that moment
of adrenaline and fear and overwhelming, you [gasps],
breathe in and water goes into your lungs
and then you go under.
So, first thing to do is just again,
like with so much of survival, staying calm,
trying to stay calm, easier said than done
when it's happened and you're not expecting it,
but trying to stay calm, not gasping, not breathing
in water and then turning around and trying to get
out of the ice the same way you went in,
a bit like with the quick sand, the only place you know
where it's gonna be stable enough
is where you've just come from.
Then you want to wriggle like a seal,
try and get out, spread your weight, get onto the ice
and stay low center of gravity all the way until you're back
onto either properly solid ice or back to the shore.
The thing that's gonna kill you quickly, fastest,
once you're out though, is the exposure.
You know, you're wet and you're in sub zero temperatures
and you don't last long without dry clothes.
So then you've gotta act fast whilst you've still
got that five minutes of adrenaline or so,
to get the wet clothes off you, roll in the powder snow,
that will absorb a lot of the water off you.
Try and get a fire going, if you can't get a fire,
ring out all your clothes and get moving
and get the blood flowing fast and try and get somewhere
where you can get a fire going or you can get to safety.
It's why really, whenever you're near frozen lakes
and you're having to cross them,
you want to do all you can to avoid having
to go out onto the ice.
Always make sure you're with a buddy.
Don't assume, you know, in the wild, when you assume,
as you know, it makes an out of you and me.
Don't just think ice is gonna be strong enough for you.
It can be really, genuinely life threatening.
And I've been through the ice of many frozen lakes.
Yeah, not fun and potentially very dangerous.
But she was lucky in the sense that she had Idris there,
who could help her out and it worked out.
[theatrical music]
You gotta look at these clips and go,
"What is the alternative?"
The alternative is giving up and you're definitely
gonna die, you know, these are worst case scenarios.
And I think that they're doing anything,
whatever it takes, it might not be perfect,
there might be better techniques with time
that people learn, but ultimately they're
in that moment and they're doing whatever they can.
And that is the heart of survival, a do or die,
never give up or try anything.
I'm not letting this beat me, that survivor mindset,
that you're gonna have to be resourceful.
You're gonna have to be smart.
You're gonna have to be calm in the crisis.
You're gonna have to be determined and resilient.
It's what separates those who make it
from those who often don't.
And in that sense, these guys, they've got it.
[dramatic music fades out]