"Into the Wild"

"Into the Wild" (2007)

It must have been close to ten years ago that one of my cousins from Grand Ronde, who I spoke with while up during the summer from college, explained to me the premise of "Into the Wild", which at that time was a best-selling book by Jon Krakeuer. Young guy, after college, gives his life savings to charity, disappears. Some time later, his body is found in Alaska in an abandoned bus far from civilization. How and why he ended up there is the story.
I honestly question whether this is one of those tales that appeals strictly to my generation. On further reflection, that is simply not the case. Anybody who has had dreams of real-life adventure will be smitten with this film. I was. In fact, given that what Chris McCandless did all took place in the year after his graduation from Emory University in 1991 struck a particular cord with me. When being told about the book, and the basic idea, ten years ago to me seemed one of the coolest things imaginable, maybe because I too was nearing the end of my college career, and was thinking more of the possible adventures that lay ahead now being free from 17 straight years of school. What McCandless did, to me in 1997-1998, was not in any way nuts. It was practically one of my many boyhood dreams.
Interestingly, the film was directed and the script written by Sean Penn, a well-known Hollywood eccentric, to put it mildly. The movie also has a number of accomplished actors, from Hal Holbrook, to Catherine Keener, to William Hurt. They all do an admirable job of filling in the roles of supporting actors to Emile Hirsch, who plays McCandless. The film starts with McCandless graduation, and then his willing "disappearance", which turns out to be an act of protest against his parents and their materialistic beliefs.
For what seems like an eternity McCandless hitchhiked around the country, staying the majority of the time in the West, in California, Washington, and even Oregon. Alaska is his ultimate destination because he wants to go "into the wild" and live. Early on he burns all of his cash and identification, and abandons his trusty car, preferring to see how far he can get on foot and rides from strangers.
There is something about this film that resonates with the yearning side of all of us. McCandless just wants to meet people, get by without money, and see how long he can live off of the land and generosity of others. The fact that a large portion of what you see in this film actually took place makes it all the more entrancing. You can feel the pain and hopes of those he encounters, their losses, their ambitions. You even feel like a friend of McCandless yourself, and sense his loneliness. His discovery of one of life's simplest truths towards the end of the film will put a lump in your throat.
If I am gushing over this movie, then by all means rent it yourself and see. Already I have gone on to Amazon.com to order the book. It is that moving. Plus the soundtrack rocks. There are very few movies that I will see more than once. This is one of them, in fact it is already one of my all-time favorites.