Into The Wild

Everybody is searching for something.
For Chris McCandless (Emile Hirsch) it's the great American adventure, to throw off the burdens of society and lead a free, basic life.
That freedom comes at a cost. But it's a cost that Chris doesn't realise, or at least refuses to acknowledge.
Directed by Sean Penn, Into The Wild is all class. It's a grand presentation starring nature itself, the breathtaking wilderness where society's rules don't apply.
Chris is a smart young man, university educated and a man who would have whatever he wanted in life, the life that the society he despises so much would give him. He's not destitute, as he points out, but he's very much running away from his life.
It is remarkable how naive Chris is, at least that is how he comes across when you consider what he is running from. Clearly he has been hurt but he also doesn't realise how what he is doing affects others. The reality of what he has done doesn't hit him until very late but when it does it is heartbreaking.
Along the way Chris, who changes his name to Alexander Supertramp, meets a number of interesting people including a hippie couple (one of which is the excellent Catherine Keener), a Scandinavian couple, an enterprising wheat farmer called Wayne (Vince Vaughn) and a lonely old man who takes Chris into his home and into his heart and begs Chris not to continue his journey to Alaska.
This is a long film but it doesn't really feel like it. It has to be a long film because to tell this story in 90 minutes wouldn't do it justice. Emile Hirsch, who I admit had never heard of before) is outstanding and he has to be for you to invest in the story. Into The Wild is warm, funny at times, but also very stark and real. It's a journey worth taking. A must see. A 9 out of 10.