Wild ride

Last night, we saw "Into the Wild," Sean Penn's big-screen version of the Jon Krakauer book. This story is something of a contemporary outdoor classic that was first excerpted in Outside magazine. I have mixed feelings about Krakauer, though I've read three of his books. I just saw a special about Krakauer and Penn on the Sundance Channel the other night, and Krakauer said something that bothered me, along the lines of "I'd rather be dead that working a 9-to-5 job." That comment would be OK from an idealistic 20-year-old but I don't need to hear it from a 53-year-old who obviously has been very fortunate in his writing career.

Anyway, a brief review of the movie. (If you don't know the story, there's a synopsis here.) I enjoyed most the vivid characters McCandless meets along the way. A lot of the people and places were very authentic, and in many cases real people rather than actors were included. The aging hippies in California, the South Dakota farmer and the Salton Sea retiree all were realistic--though I struggled most to accept the goateed Vince Vaughn as the farmer. It's a tribute to Krakauer's reporting that he pieced this story together and tracked down all these people. I also appreciated the attention to detail: filming around the same abandoned bus where McCandless stayed in Alaska, using early 1990s fashion and lots of pay phones and letters. This is a maddening and tragic story along the lines of "Grizzly Man." Interesting that both took place in Alaska, and I think there's a line in the book from a resident Alaskan who comments on the random people that the state attracts.