Into the Wild (15.)
Directed by Sean Penn.
Starring Emile Hirsch, William Hurt, Marcia Gay Harden, Jena Malone, Vince Vaughn, Catherine Keener. 150 mins.
Sean Penn has always struck me as the kind of man who’d jab you with his finger when making a point in an argument. So who’d have thought that Hollywood’s most hectoring, self righteous movie star would make such a profoundly touching, questioning, non didactic film? If his acting fame didn’t muddy the waters Penn would currently be getting praised as one of America’s most gifted emerging directors.
Based on a true story, the film follows the story of Christopher McCandless, a gifted student who drops out after graduating and takes off into the great American wilderness, heading in the direction of Alaska. His action is both a rebellion against his parents’ perceived hypocrisy and an expression of a desire to live life to the full.
The film is a euphoric celebration both of the American landscape and the desire for freedom while at the same time showing that there is something hateful about McCandless’ rebellion and its carefree judgemental intolerance. It’s obnoxious the way he holds his parents and the whole world up to impossibly high standards and finds them wanting.
There are numerous very brief appearances vy name actors and Penn gets something of value from each of them. Vaughn has rarely been better though the real stand out is Hal Holbrook as a lonely old man, so thoroughly unaffected and fresh you’d never guess he had over 100 screen credits to his name.
Penn handles scenery with the same delicacy and skill that he handles his actors, getting remarkable results without forcing it. Any big name director can get you majestic shots of the American panorama but they’ll looked posed, their magnificence locked up in their framed perfection. Into The Wild’s vistas have an effortless vibrancy, like the movie had been made with a point and shoot directness.
This is a Landscape Movie, packed with extraordinary views of wide open spaces and the film itself is so broad in its intelligence and emotional engagement that it makes most every other films feel like a peek through a crack in the door.
Directed by Sean Penn.
Starring Emile Hirsch, William Hurt, Marcia Gay Harden, Jena Malone, Vince Vaughn, Catherine Keener. 150 mins.
Sean Penn has always struck me as the kind of man who’d jab you with his finger when making a point in an argument. So who’d have thought that Hollywood’s most hectoring, self righteous movie star would make such a profoundly touching, questioning, non didactic film? If his acting fame didn’t muddy the waters Penn would currently be getting praised as one of America’s most gifted emerging directors.
Based on a true story, the film follows the story of Christopher McCandless, a gifted student who drops out after graduating and takes off into the great American wilderness, heading in the direction of Alaska. His action is both a rebellion against his parents’ perceived hypocrisy and an expression of a desire to live life to the full.
The film is a euphoric celebration both of the American landscape and the desire for freedom while at the same time showing that there is something hateful about McCandless’ rebellion and its carefree judgemental intolerance. It’s obnoxious the way he holds his parents and the whole world up to impossibly high standards and finds them wanting.
There are numerous very brief appearances vy name actors and Penn gets something of value from each of them. Vaughn has rarely been better though the real stand out is Hal Holbrook as a lonely old man, so thoroughly unaffected and fresh you’d never guess he had over 100 screen credits to his name.
Penn handles scenery with the same delicacy and skill that he handles his actors, getting remarkable results without forcing it. Any big name director can get you majestic shots of the American panorama but they’ll looked posed, their magnificence locked up in their framed perfection. Into The Wild’s vistas have an effortless vibrancy, like the movie had been made with a point and shoot directness.
This is a Landscape Movie, packed with extraordinary views of wide open spaces and the film itself is so broad in its intelligence and emotional engagement that it makes most every other films feel like a peek through a crack in the door.
