ANCHOR INTRO: Actress Reese Witherspoon was so impressed by Cheryl Strayed’s memoir Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Coast Trail that she bought the rights two years ago for her production company to adapt. KPBS arts reporter Beth Accomando says the film opens this weekend and provides a showcase for Witherspoon. WILD 2 (ba) 1:18 In 1994, Cheryl Strayed needed to find a way to heal herself following a divorce, her mother’s death, and a self-destructive lifestyle. So she decided to take a walk… a thousand mile one. CLIP I decided to hike the Pacific Crest Trail. It goes from the Mexican border up to Canada. I’ll be walking for the next 3 months. Wild is the story of one woman’s journey to find herself and as such it’s relativity free of standard narrative conflicts. Instead serves up a lot of introspection and internal dialogue. CLIP You can quit any time. If you know the real story then you already know the outcome. Director Jean-Marc Vallee has a relaxed style that doesn’t rush the story, and that allows for a free flowing stream of consciousness to develop as Cheryl reexamines her life. Reese Witherspoon as Cheryl and Laura Dern as her mother are top notch in a low key, naturalistic way. But the film fails to make nature a vivid character in this journey and it needs to be. Wild’s too artistically tame to get wild about but it’s to be appreciated as a personal tale of healing. Beth Accomando, KPBS News.
Actress Reese Witherspoon was so impressed by Cheryl Strayed’s memoir "Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Coast Trail" that she bought the rights two years ago for her production company to adapt into the new film "Wild" (opening in select theaters Dec. 12).
In 1994, Cheryl Strayed needed to find a way to heal herself following a divorce, her mother’s death, and a self-destructive lifestyle. So she decided to take a walk—a 1,000-mile one.
"I decided to hike the Pacific Crest Trail. It goes from the Mexican border up to Canada. I’ll be walking for the next 3 months," her character (played by Reese Witherspoon) in the film explains.
"Wild" is the story of one woman’s journey to find herself and as such, there's a lot of introspection and internal dialogue. So it’s relativity free of standard narrative conflicts. She faces the hardships presented by nature (heat, cold, lack of water) and some internal struggles but there's not a lot of dramatic tension since she is by herself and, as she states, she can quit any time. This isn't about survival in the way "127 Hours" was (about a hiker who had to amputate his own arm in order to free himself from being stuck between a rock and a hard place).
In a sense, Strayed's story offers a smarter version of what Christopher McCandless did. For very different reasons than Strayed, he walked away from his life and ventured into the wild but he was so ill-prepared that he ultimately died of starvation just a few miles from civilization. Strayed, by contrast, filled her pack with so many items (dehydrated food, stove, water bag, water purifying kit) that her backpack ended up towering over her (she nicknamed it Monster). This did not trivialize what she did or how challenging it was but in terms of narrative structure, there is simply not a lot of dramatic tension. We are engaged in her story because we want to know where her journey takes her and if she finds the peace she is looking for.
If you know the real story then you already know the outcome of her journey. Director Jean-Marc Vallee has a relaxed style that doesn’t rush the story or the character. He succeeds in creating a free flowing stream of consciousness to show how Strayed is reexamining her life. Reese Witherspoon as Cheryl and Laura Dern as her mother are top notch in a low key, naturalistic way. But the film fails to make nature a vivid character in Strayed's journey and it needs to be.
"Wild" (rated R for sexual content, nudity, drug use, and language) is too artistically tame to get wild about but it’s to be appreciated as a a sincere and personal tale of healing.
