Into the Wild

Penn does a lovingly beautiful job in retelling Chris' story. The research by both author and film maker must have been difficult. Superb casting. But don't misunderstand our 'hero'. Hubris has spoiled many. Chris was certainly an angry, self-centered fellow, and hurt, but what good did his journey do? (Perhaps as another reminder for us.) It is only when he is facing death that his vision is clear. Is this what Tolstoy and other writers who Chris admired meant? He was a rebel, but what was his cause? Still, we certainly feel for him, and those lives he touched.

Into the Wild follows the real-life story of an early-20's recent grad who gives up his middle-class life, his car and all his money and sets off on a hitchiker journey through America, finally settling in Alaska.

This movie really struck a chord with me on an emotional level, I've also often thought of eschewing all material things before, realizing it can never be the true source of happiness. But as the main character tragically realizes, neither is loneliness and isolation. Great movie with a powerful, haunting music score by Eddie Vedder.

This recently-released film is based on the true story of Chris McCandless, as described in Jon Krakauer's original story, "Into the Wild". In this film version, the audience is treated to the haunting tale of a young college graduate who, for a variety of personal reasons, decides to breakout from his mundane existence and start life over again. The issues and demons that beseige a rather emotionally-fragile Chris are not ordinary: an unhappy family environment, a domineering father and a petulant mother, and the realization that he and his sisters are really only bastards after all. The film follows the course of Chris's escape into the Alaskan wilderness over a three-year period, as he abandons a career, a need for money, and any association with his old life. His journey is a troubled one because it is based on the dangerous assumption that all one has to do to start over again is to live alone in nature. All the way along the road to the top of the of world, this passion for living in the pristine wilderness by himself drives him to drop friends as quickly as he makes them. Naively, he thinks that all he has to do to enjoy a new lease on life, disencumbered of any worldly impediments, is to move out into the great beyond where there is no human contact from his past. However, the problem, as the movie describes, is not found in the initial undertaking so much as the low chances of surviving in the wilderness if something goes wrong. The inexperienced Chris, with all his Walden-type idealism, would prove to be his own worst enemy shortly after arriving in Alaska. Besides telling a sad story, the movie does a great job in capturing the natural beauty of the Lower 48 and Alaska itself. Also, Chris's sister plays an effective role as background narrator in helping to fill the audience with pertinent pieces of his earlier life. Well worth seeing just to capture the sense of life on the open road!