Into The Wild

But he abandoned them as well for the wild. Why?

The ending was so sad. I mean I expected it but still, a little more explanation might be nice. I guess there wasn't any because no one knows why?

All in all it was a compelling movie. I didn't like some of camera angles they used a all. I would have liked things to be more straight forward in general but I liked it.

I know why, but it's not exactly something that can be easily explained to someone who doesn't 'get it'. Also I prefer the non-linear approach in this film and the ambitious camera angles. Who wants the same old story over and over, told the same way? And to blame J.J. Abrams is kind of funny, he is certainly not the first or the most influential to use this technique.

Have you read Thoreau's 'Walden' or 'Civil Disobedience'? He was searching for truth, they both were.

This film is based on a true story, and people's real actions are sometimes harder to understand than those of fictional characters. By the way I give this film .

"I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived."

- Henry David Thoreau

Into the Wild (Sean Penn, 2007)



The tragic true-life story of Chris McCandless is brought to the screen by writer/producer/director Sean Penn in a meticulous production which not only honors the young man, but enables Penn to fly like the birds with all the flair of the high altitude jets' contrails. I'll try to explain that soon enough, but first off, this film presents, at least to me, Sean Penn's most heartfelt, poetic and personal depiction of his prowess as a filmmaker thus far. Penn basically takes a straightforward, yet heartbreaking story, and impressionistically makes it as complex as he possibly can. But, I believe that the result is so inclusive that most people won't even notice all the gymnastics he actually brought to the powerful story.

In the Spring of 1992, McCandless (who renamed himself Alexander Supertramp) made his way to the wilderness north of Fairbanks, Alaska. This was the culmination of a two-year journey where he rejected all the things which his rich, but unhappy family believed in. This journey is told in parallel lines which are made even more complex by Sean Penn's technique. Basically, one thread of the film follows Chris' story in Alaska, from the time he found the remote "Magic Bus" up through his fate. The other thread shows him graduating from college two years earlier and traveling across the country on his own personal odyssey to find the truth without ever resorting to communicate with his parents (William Hurt and Marcia Gay Harden) or his loving younger sister (Jena Malone).




Another way in which the film is told in multiple ways is that McCandless' diary sometimes tells the story, while at other times, his sister narrates their story, which not only includes the loss their parents feel after he disappears, but includes earlier episodes of family tension involving adultery and earlier expressions of disharmony amongst the family before Chris went "into the wild". On his journey, Chris comes across many interesting people who are also living an alternate lifestyle, and he also becomes a true adventurer. Some of the most spectacular scenes in the film, besides those in Alaska, involve his kayaking through the Grand Canyon without a permit or a helmet and his subsequent kayaking trip to the Sea of Cortez.



The contradiction which I find in the character is that he obviously rejects his parents' way of life, but he never honestly seems to reject people in general because he comes across far too many giving individuals who want to help him. He seems to have his sights set on a way to "punish" his parents, but his naivete leads him to shortsidedly neglect certain provisions to get himself out of a "no-win" situation. As the film gets closer to the end, Chris' "fellow travelers" reach out to him more and more, none more than the 80-ish Ron (Hal Holbrook), who is a kindred spirit and a truly worthy grandfather for the young man. Looking at things in hindsight, the saddest part of the movie is when Chris leaves Ron.



Basically, Penn uses every technique he can think of to tell this story. Besides using Eddie Vedder's personal songs, he includes plot-pertinent oldies such as "Going Up the Country" and "King of the Road". He also includes fake home movies, split screens, freeze frames, poetic shots of birds and high altitude jets, and they are all meant to show a young man's quest for freedom. Most of us yearn for and dream of getting away from it all, but Chris McCandless actually got literally away from it all, and this film is his memorial. I know that some people dislike Sean Penn because of his politics, but his artistry is evident all over this mostly-unassuming film which is chockful of individuality.

Would my version of getting away involve killing and eating animals or, for that matter, going to Alaska?

He regretted that by the way.

They caused him pain, was that acceptable?

Different strokes...

Anyway, Bleached you read a book every day or two, maybe you should check this one out. It may give you a little more insight than the film.

Let me ask you this, bleached. Why did you watch this film? It sounds to me like you knew it would piss you off. I'd also love for you to come here in your earlier voice when you had no kids and probably thought more about yourself and what you thought was right (although I know you still believe that you think you know what's right, even if it's different than it was when you were Chris's age). I'm not trying to rag on you, but the kid is dead, so he can't respond to your questions. It's just that I find it hard to believe that you are the same now as you were 30 years ago because I know for a fact that I'm not.

It's not like he intentionally goes Into the Wild so he can starve himself to death, Prestige.