Director – Sean Penn.
Cast – Emile Hirsch, Marcia Gay Harden, William Hurt, Jena Malone, Vince Vaughn, Kristen Stewart, Catherine Keener, Hal Holbrook.
Sean Penn has arrived at this point in his career despite Shanghai Surprise, We’re No Angels and Madonna. Maybe that explains why he is so earnest and serious about his work. He has made the fair share of his mistakes already and seems to be driven by the fear of repeating them. In this respect he can rest easy about Into The Wild as it can most definitely be deemed a success.
This true story centres on an idealistic and pig headed teenager whose world-view is skewed as a result of his parent’s fraught marriage and materialistic way of life. As soon as he has graduated from college he sets off on an open-ended trip looking to discover as much as he can about the United States and himself.
The first half an hour grates due to the smugness and cockiness of Christopher McCandless (Emile Hirsch) as he begins his trek across America and as far away from his family as possible. I must admit that at this point I was rooting against McCandless. When the central character in the film is so difficult to empathise with it is left to the incidental characters to fill the void and this is where the Into The Wild succeeds in a big way. Being essentially a road movie we are treated to a variety of interesting sub stories and wise characters that try and impart some of their wisdom to him. We have the pleasure of meeting the wheeler-dealer with a heart played by Vince Vaughan, the maternal hippie played by Catherine Keener and the kind and lonely old man played by veteran Hal Holbrook. Unusually these are the characters that drive the film and I felt more for them than I did for the central character himself.
There are some incredibly poignant incidental scenes that show that the human race is still capable of selfless acts. A scene where McCandless gives the quarter he was going to use to call home to an elderly man so the man can continue begging his wife on a payphone for one last chance is heartbreaking.
Sean Penn manages to drag a powerful performance from relative newcomer Emile Hirsch and keeps everything moving along at a fair pace. Like Christopher McCandless he is something of an environmentalist himself and as a result we are treated to seeing pockets of America that are still relatively untouched and beautiful. A mention must go to the soundtrack by Pearl Jam’s Eddie Vedder that is quietly inspiring.
All in all the body of the story is basically that of a selfish and immature boy punishing his parents in a way that allows him to be grandiose and patronizing at the same time. The friends he makes and the people that care for him are the real inspiration here.
Cast – Emile Hirsch, Marcia Gay Harden, William Hurt, Jena Malone, Vince Vaughn, Kristen Stewart, Catherine Keener, Hal Holbrook.
Sean Penn has arrived at this point in his career despite Shanghai Surprise, We’re No Angels and Madonna. Maybe that explains why he is so earnest and serious about his work. He has made the fair share of his mistakes already and seems to be driven by the fear of repeating them. In this respect he can rest easy about Into The Wild as it can most definitely be deemed a success.
This true story centres on an idealistic and pig headed teenager whose world-view is skewed as a result of his parent’s fraught marriage and materialistic way of life. As soon as he has graduated from college he sets off on an open-ended trip looking to discover as much as he can about the United States and himself.
The first half an hour grates due to the smugness and cockiness of Christopher McCandless (Emile Hirsch) as he begins his trek across America and as far away from his family as possible. I must admit that at this point I was rooting against McCandless. When the central character in the film is so difficult to empathise with it is left to the incidental characters to fill the void and this is where the Into The Wild succeeds in a big way. Being essentially a road movie we are treated to a variety of interesting sub stories and wise characters that try and impart some of their wisdom to him. We have the pleasure of meeting the wheeler-dealer with a heart played by Vince Vaughan, the maternal hippie played by Catherine Keener and the kind and lonely old man played by veteran Hal Holbrook. Unusually these are the characters that drive the film and I felt more for them than I did for the central character himself.
There are some incredibly poignant incidental scenes that show that the human race is still capable of selfless acts. A scene where McCandless gives the quarter he was going to use to call home to an elderly man so the man can continue begging his wife on a payphone for one last chance is heartbreaking.
Sean Penn manages to drag a powerful performance from relative newcomer Emile Hirsch and keeps everything moving along at a fair pace. Like Christopher McCandless he is something of an environmentalist himself and as a result we are treated to seeing pockets of America that are still relatively untouched and beautiful. A mention must go to the soundtrack by Pearl Jam’s Eddie Vedder that is quietly inspiring.
All in all the body of the story is basically that of a selfish and immature boy punishing his parents in a way that allows him to be grandiose and patronizing at the same time. The friends he makes and the people that care for him are the real inspiration here.
3 comments:
I couldn't agree with you more! I found that at the end of the movie i was offended that i was supposed to feel sorry for this kid when he died.
I'm 44, and i can think of similar things that have happened in the lives of people around me. They didn't choose to be selfish and immature by running away from their past. Instead they embraced that their upbringing wasn't ideal, but it was their upbringing. You either choose to embrace fully and repeat how you were raised, or realize that you overcome your background.
Emile played Chris well, and will probably get nominated for many awards, but the real life Chris is NO hero for turning his back on his family for slights, real or imagined, that they fostered upon him.
Hi there,
Thanks so much for your feedback and congratulations on being the very first comment on the blog!! I can't believe you stumbled across it and it's amazing you gave your time to write your opinion.
Thanks a million!
As an idealist 20 year old kid (let me admit that from the get go) I have to say I can't totally agree with you. Having read the book, the original article that spawned it, and having the same restless soul that McCandless possesses, I can tell you that should I go out on some grand adventure such as this, it wouldn't be meant as a slap to my parents. Invariably, they would be hurt, but causing pain to his parents was NOT the desired outcome of his adventure.
Second, I know for a fact Supertramp (though his namesake suggested otherwise) was not out to be 'a hero'. In fact, most everything the kid has done or aspired to do was done in hopes of selflessness. Did you know one of his goals before this trip was to travel to South Africa to battle Apartheid? Idealistic, yes, selfish at times, absolutely, but aspiring to be an American folk hero was never part of this kid's goals.
Personally, I think he missed the point, but I hardly think it makes him somebody to hate. I aspire to join the Peace Corps (or some similar organizatin) before joining the workforce, in lieu of a 'grand adventure' a la Alexander Supertramp.
This is my question for any of you who choose to read this:
What do you think McCandless would have done after he came out of Denali? Certainly he did not aspire to leatherneck it all his life... so what do you think the possible life of a 44 year old McCandless would have been like? Career paths I see him going down are devoting his life to NGOs, fighting starvation (and what a selfish, conceited cause THAT is, wouldn't you say, Denehan)or if nothing else, settling down as whatever. Certainly, this trip didn't make him a weaker individual, someone to loath and mock. Yes, the indiscretions to his parents were extreme, but if he had made it out of there alive and joined the world with a newfound compassion, knowledge and self-awareness that threw him into the world a better person, would you really say things like 'he is NO hero'?
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