into the wild [A]

moviemcpeake snippet: As I sit surrounded by taupe walls, white noise, and to do lists a mile long, it is not hard to understand how an internal passion drives the hero and villain of this film. Alexander Supertramp (Christopher McCandless)’s decisions will cause many conflicting feelings. Was he just a selfish young man with no regards for the people who cared about him, did he not care or think he was invincible, was he mentally unstable, was he incredible, was he brave, was he just running confused…

He was his own savior and his own worse enemy. He rescues and hurts. He was a black and white of himself. He was brilliant and yes, didn’t have to die but we are all fallible. There was something incredible about the path he chose, something that I completely understand but I am not sure I can explain. Was he arrogant? Of course. Was he human? Absolutely.

“It is easy, when you are young, to believe that what you desire is no less than what you deserve, to assume that if you want something badly enough , it is your God-given right to have it. . . I was a raw youth who mistook passion for insight and acted according to an obscure, gap-ridden logic. I thought climbing the Devils Thumb would fix all that was wrong with my life. In the end, of course, it changed almost nothing. But I came to appreciate that mountains make poor receptacles for dreams...“
-Jon Krakauer (author of Into The Wild)

“Two years he walks the earth. No phone, no pool, no pets, no cigarettes. Ultimate freedom. An extremist. An aesthetic voyager whose home is the road…”
-McCandless

After reading the book, magazine articles, and now experiencing his journey on film, I cringe when people or editorials call this an adventure. An adventure is not something personally revealing, a struggle of good and evil or full of baggage and life. You cannot fit was Chris accomplished into a neat little adventure package. This was an epic journey for one’s survival and Jon Krakauer and Sean Penn captured his journey of enlightenment and fatality in the most poetic way imaginable.

recommendation: see it. read it. own the dvd (should be great extras) and then buy the soundtrack because eddie vedder kills it. it is the complete package.