Movie Reviews: Into the Wild

It's been a while since I've posted last review, so here it comes. Latest ukulele posts lead me to Eddie Vedder, an author of soundtrack to this movie. I gave it a listen and it immediately made me want to watch it again. Totally worth it.

'Into the Wild' is a movie based on a biographical book about Chris McCandless, fellow who left all of his previous life behind him and began his big journey to the Alaska. It's quite unbelievable that the story is in the matter of fact real, life of Chris was so fascinating. So, who he was? Young, recently graduated student, in a perfect physical shape, with great perspectives on the future, but there was something that made him different from others. Passion in looking for a meaning of life, a huge admiration of living in the pure nature, unwillingness to become a regular part of society of egoists and conformists. Add bad relationship with family (except his younger sister) and you have a full reasoning of his decision.

His first step was to abbadon his possesions. He gave his money to the charity, left his car on a desert, burned his money and id. He took up a new name: Alex. Alex Supertramp. He began to hitchhike, worked on an ocassion and met many interesting people on his way.

Those people was the real treasure of his journey, they shaped him in some way. Wheter it was a couple of hippies, which befriended him, farm owner, who gave him a job or an old veteran without a family, who treated him as his own son, Chris got on well with them, opposed to his earlier relations with people. He was very passionate about his goals. All of the people he met tried to help him realise how crazy it was, but he was stubborn. Chris enriched them in some way, even changed a life of a few of them.

After few years of just travelling he managed to settle in deep forest of Alaska. He found an old bus, which served him as a new home. Chris finally felt alive. He was alone with the nature, living on his own, his life was depending only on his will to survive. He spent whole days just reading his favourite books, hunting for food or just meditating in the wild. It was all he ever wanted.

 

And here comes the tragedy. Chris wasn't prepared properly. He ignored the fact that the nature is changing, and when he finally wanted to come back, he had no way to escape, the river cut the road he came from. With reduced food nations, he was sentenced to starvation. He died after eating poisonous berries, alone.

The picture is really moving. The main actor played his role flawlessly, he really put much work to resemble real life Chris. The soundtrack is a thing which makes the impression even stronger, it's obvious that Vedder was fascinated by the story.

The movie is really thought-provoking and controversial. Some people say that Chris was an idiot, he tried to survive in the wild without any training, with too little food and necessary equipment. Some say that he was a loser, he couldn't fix his relationship with the family and people in genreal, so he ran away, not facing the real problems. It's hard to not agree with such opinions, but a part of me still admires Chris and his actions. He was really brave to follow his dreams, of course he could do it without hurting others, but he is still an impressive person, and more important, inspiring person. Every time I see the movie I immediately want to leave all of the unimportant worries of everyday life and go on a journey full of adventures. Not necessarily on Alaska to live without others, but I feel that sooner or later it will happen, just because I'm young, stupid and as naive as Chris was :).