Into The Wild is an extraordinary portrait of a confused man on a confused journey deep into the heart and soul of America while trying to find and lose himself along the way. While I never really liked Chirs, I came to understand him and was affected by his journey.
It’s a film of big ideas and extraordinary adventures that is deep, exciting and fun. While it does stretch on too long (I got impatient after reaching the 2 hour mark), it is well worth the trip and worth it on the big screen to see the majesty and natural beauty of locations from South Dakota, down the Colorado River and into the very heart of the Alaskan wilderness.
But this movie is about more than the journey on the road, it is about the desire for something else, for something different and for something better, if such a thing actually exists. As we follow Christopher McCandless (ne’ Alexander Supertramp) in his rebellious quest to destroy his belongings, shed his middle class comforts and live off the land, he abandons his family and college education and raises a big middle finger to the society that has protected him during his first 21 years of life. But what drives him is the ultimate question of the movie. Certainly his abandonment and the devastation that brings to his family is a truly selfish act, though the selfishness of his actions are not fully explored, perhaps because he did not see it this way. He fled a dark and violent family life (that in reality wasn’t anywhere near as dark or violent as he had it in his own mind).
And he did so without the knowledge or experience needed to survive. He made many mistakes, two of which proved fatal. Is death the ultimate freedom he sought and the only way for him to find what he was looking for?
Or is there something bigger? Something that drives us all to see more, to be more to live more or to experience more? And if we allow that quest to drive us too far, will it be out undoing? Will we get trapped, like Chris did, on a secluded island by a roaring river with no hope, alone with no one to share his experience with?
Perhaps it is companionship that drives us – the ability to share our experience - as Christopher was to finally realize, “Happiness only real when shared.”
It’s a film of big ideas and extraordinary adventures that is deep, exciting and fun. While it does stretch on too long (I got impatient after reaching the 2 hour mark), it is well worth the trip and worth it on the big screen to see the majesty and natural beauty of locations from South Dakota, down the Colorado River and into the very heart of the Alaskan wilderness.
But this movie is about more than the journey on the road, it is about the desire for something else, for something different and for something better, if such a thing actually exists. As we follow Christopher McCandless (ne’ Alexander Supertramp) in his rebellious quest to destroy his belongings, shed his middle class comforts and live off the land, he abandons his family and college education and raises a big middle finger to the society that has protected him during his first 21 years of life. But what drives him is the ultimate question of the movie. Certainly his abandonment and the devastation that brings to his family is a truly selfish act, though the selfishness of his actions are not fully explored, perhaps because he did not see it this way. He fled a dark and violent family life (that in reality wasn’t anywhere near as dark or violent as he had it in his own mind).
And he did so without the knowledge or experience needed to survive. He made many mistakes, two of which proved fatal. Is death the ultimate freedom he sought and the only way for him to find what he was looking for?
Or is there something bigger? Something that drives us all to see more, to be more to live more or to experience more? And if we allow that quest to drive us too far, will it be out undoing? Will we get trapped, like Chris did, on a secluded island by a roaring river with no hope, alone with no one to share his experience with?
Perhaps it is companionship that drives us – the ability to share our experience - as Christopher was to finally realize, “Happiness only real when shared.”
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Los Angeles
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