Where the Wild Things Are Review

Over the past nine years since its release Spike Jonze's Where the Wild Things Are has gone from the target of skepticism of most audiences and fans of the book to the little movie that could, seen as an under-appreciated gem that managed to keep the original spirit of Maurice Sendak's classic children's book while also being its own profound statement on childhood. While I consider myself to be an unofficial member of the deeper thinking branch of the film lover's community I can't get to the point where I say that I like Where the Wild Things Are or even that I see how it could be an underrated classic in its own right.



Max (Max Records) is a lonely, emotionally distraught young boy begins to feel increasingly at odds with reality as his sister has acquired a new group of friends and his mother has found a new boyfriend to, in his mind, replace his absentee father. After an angry blowout with his mom, Max runs away through the woods and eventually finds a boat that takes him to a land full of giant, emotionally unstable monsters. Establishing himself as their king and vowing to find the secret to lasting happiness that they desire, Max keeps them busy with fun activities and attempts to juggle their conflicting desires and constantly shifting tantrums.



Before I begin with my considerable list of issues I have with the film I should start out with the positives. It's masterfully shot, with shakeycam contrasted against tripod cinematography to great effect; the shakey came is used only in times of great emotional distress for Max so that we feel the same anxiety he's going through and the still shots are used to help the audience sense that all is calm and we are finally at peace. Spike Jonze clearly has a great love and understanding of the source material as most of the imagery and narrative ideas are faithfully brought to life, though where the film stubbles most is in trying to directly translate lines from the book into dialogue; it just sounds very unnatural and was clearly crowbared in to contain the link to the book through means other than the visual. However, the rest of the dialogue is pretty well written, able to capture that kind of nonsense logic that comes so easily to children when engaged in school yard games of imagination, where everybody's goal is not to have fun, but to win the game or argument being had. The decision to render the Wild Things themselves with a combination of Jim Henson-style puppets and digital effects was a genuine stroke of genius, as they feel much like living stuffed toys come to life, at once cuddly and charming but also independent and dangerous. The acting is mostly good, with the voice actors for the Wild Things handing in great performances. The kid can sometimes be a bit bland, but he does really well in the emotional moments, which often hit with such authenticity to my own childhood experiences that it could be uncomfortable to sit through.



The biggest problem that I have with the film is that despite it gaining a reputation as being fantastic for both children and adults I'm not sure how much kids would get out of it. The film is fundamentally about deep, lingering sadness and while some children who have been through especially troubled times will connect with something like that I think that this kind of unhappiness is something better understood by adults than by children. Also, I think what the film has missed that the book understood perfectly is that a message or helpful experience is nothing without something to keep the audience's attention. If The Lion King, for example, didn't have an engaging story, exciting action scenes and strong characters then I highly doubt anybody would've cared about its message of responsibility and facing the past. The original Wild Things book understood this and had an entertaining fairy tale and instantly iconic illustrations to entertain children while they vicariously worked out their own anger and frustrations through Max. The film, however, doesn't really have a lot of fun factor that I can see as it's 80% talking about depressing topics and hashing out interpersonal grievances. Compelling for an adult perhaps, but I know if I saw this as a kid I'd be bored out of my mind. Even the wild rumpus isn't really there for fun; it's a plot point used to portray Max's attempts to make the Wild Things happy and how ultimately it will fail. Again, interesting for adults but I can only imagine a child would wonder why they weren't having more fun watching the movie.



I'm really torn on Where the Wild Things Are. On the one hand, the film has no discernible entertainment value, but then again it was meant to be an exploration of dark issues. This exploration doesn't come packed into any sort of conventional narrative, but perhaps that was an intentional attempted imitation of the kind of chaotic emotional logic relied upon by children. It doesn't seem like children would take much from this film, but I myself am not a child so I can't tell for certain. One thing I can say with absolute certainty is that I will revisit this film eventually and I hope it improves upon repeated viewings.