Into the Wild

Into the Wild is sincere and passionate. Sean Penn believes in the words and mission of Christopher McCandless that his portrait of him looks past any of the ideas of his naivety or stupidity. The film delves so deeply into his personality that the film knows no other narrator besides his sister who gives a history of the father-mother battles and his distance from that situation. The narration buys into what everything McCandless says is not only truthful, but insightful. His death isn't just a stupid mistake, but a self sacrifice offering of his soul to the wilderness, even if evidence says otherwise. Penn can say his film is an adaptation of Krakauer's book, but he inflicts his own beliefs as well. Penn goes all out to make this film a sermon from the church of a renegade college graduate - camera tricks are everywhere to emphasize the dramatics and much of the dialogue is personal confession from McCandless himself. Penn's over exuberance comes off as him giving into the weight of telling this story by making no moment too small. Technically, I would have cut a lot of the camera effects but this film is driven by its impressions instead of its perfection. The best decision the film does for itself is having an extended length. The get-to-knowing of McCandless in the story makes his eventual death truly tragic. Even if the back story paints a different picture of McCandless, Penn is mostly successful is painting his own image of the crusader. A different film may be able to get a more rounded picture of McCandless, but I'm not sure if it could get a closer one.