Am I an asshole for DESPISING the movie Into the Wild?

[graywarrior]

I know the kid had parent issues, but WTF? You live on the road and in the wilderness for over a year and you end up taking a risk like that? What was his point? Couldn't he have read the plant book before he ate the wrong thing?

[AlCzervik]

1. i liked it. I guess he wanted to try and live off the grid but i thought the people

he met along the way were interesting and he seemed to have an effect on their lives.

[graywarrior]

2. It was a well done movie, and I really wanted to like it...but

I must be too judgemental. Or just mental.

[AlCzervik]

3. you just didn't like it, no crime in that.

****you are mental**** though.
:7 :loveya:

[graywarrior]

4. Takes one to know one.

:evilgrin:

[Blue_In_AK]

21. But did you like Alaska, though?

That's the only important part. I give Sean Penn a lot of credit for filming the movie here in the state instead of British Columbia or Washington State or some other non-Alaska place where most movies and TV shows about Alaska are filmed.

[siligut]

5. No, you are not an asshole.

We all have a bit of Holden Caulfield in us, but reality is real. The references to Christ were the most telling. Sad and pitiful at the same time.

Also, it is only Krakauer’s theory that he ate something that killed him, a sort of saving face, in a way.

[graywarrior]

8. Yeah, we really don't know what happened to him, do we?

[democracyindanger]

6. You should read the book

It's mostly about the kid, but there's an interesting chapter about other people who've done the same thing in the past; just wandered off into the wilderness. It's like this rare phenomenon of human nature, some evolutionary bug that clicks and makes somebody think, "I'm going to be a caveman again" and off they go.

[graywarrior]

7. Every year they find some "caveman" in the woods up here dead for a year or so.

Plus people come up here to commit suicide on the mountain.

[Lex]

17. Do you feel empathy or sympathy toward those people

or does it just make you think :wtf:

[suninvited]

9. I only read the book and it was several years ago

I think the guy actually knew a lot about plants. I liked the book, but it was sad.

[graywarrior]

10. Maybe I'll like the book better.

I can't put my finger on why I didn't like the movie.

[mreilly]

11. The book/movie have haunted me for a while

I don't think you're a bad person for despising the movie. I have some problems with it as well.

I don't agree with the actions taken by Chris McCandless or his outlook towards society and definitions of "freedom" (I'd rather free my mind while holding down a full-time job which feeds, clothes and shelters my family and I as opposed to freeing my body and spending the better part of my days looking for food and shelter) but perhaps because I'm a parent of three I haven't been able to get this story out of my head since reading the book & seeing the movie.

I wouldn't say I even like the story per se - something about a smart kid dying of starvation alone in the woods in some filthy bus seems particularly poignant - but it's definitely a memorable one that leaves an impact. However I disagree with the way McCandless has been painted by Krakauer and Sean Penn. I don't think McCandless was a bad guy but I also don't believe he was a role model to be celebrated. I think he left his family in a lot of pain and bewilderment by rejecting them and disappearing, and I also suppose I find his antagonism towards conventional society somewhat juvenile and nihilistic; the rants of a teenager who never knew adversity or hardship. I'm somewhat amazed and a bit dismayed that McCandless seems to have some sort of cult following, some of whom have even journeyed to Alaska to hike in and visit the old bus in which he died. That just seems very, very creepy to me.

After reading a lot of stuff online on the subject, I don't believe McCandless died of toxic poisoning from seeds or fungus or anything like that. I think he simply starved to death. His body wasn't bringing in sufficient calories to support the calories he was burning foraging for food, wood, water and such. I also think it's possible he may have unconsciously let himself die due to self-loathing.

However, it seems to me the entire "McCandless was a hero" outlook hinges on the fact Penn and Krakauer need to reject the starvation scenario in favor of something else that makes McCandless look less green and naive. Ergo, in their view he must have accidentally poisoned himself. They seem to want to promote the idea that "It isn't that Chris didn't know what he was doing or wanted to die; he merely mistook one kind of seed for another." Maybe they're acting out of good intentions and an honest belief in this theory, but the whole deal smacks of revisionism and sensationalism to me.

[Sequoia]

12. Ha, ha....you're pretty funny.

Kinda like when God told Adam and Eve NOT TO EAT the Magic Mushroom and they did anyway 'cause the snake dude said it just fine and dandy and would "open their eyes".

I thought I'd buy the book but it's not many pages. If I spend money on a book it better have more than 100 pages.

[graywarrior]

13. Harry Potter is so much more real and with lots and lots of pages

[Sequoia]

18. Too much for me actually.

I was in for jury duty last year and this woman there had just got the latest Harry Potter book which she carried around. The lawyers saw that and let her go. I'm thinking they didn't like that book because she answered their questions intelligently.

[graywarrior]

25. I can see why they let her go based on what was in the last book

[Lex]

14. It was a true story. Everyone takes away something different.

Some don't take anything away at all.

I think all of the above is fine.

[ashling]

15. Anybody else have any thoughts

on why graywarrior is an asshole. It may have nothing to do with this movie.
(just kidding :hi: )

[graywarrior]

16. Why....I outta....

:cry:





:rofl:

[ashling]

19. I started to ask if there were any other choices LOL

Awww, I wouldn't hurt your feelin's for anything. :hi:

[graywarrior]

26. I know!

I love you!
:toast:

[XemaSab]

20. I read the book

and I wound up thinking the guy was sort of an asshole.

It seems to me like he had a lot of bullshit libertarian ideas. The idea of perfect self-sufficiency is a total myth. Humans need community. As the archaeologist at work put it, there has never been a human culture where people could live on their own. To be expelled from the tribe was basically a death sentence.

That being said, the book sort of depressed the hell out of me. Whether he ate the wrong seeds or not, he would have died out there sooner or later. The real stupidity was thinking he could live alone in the wilderness of Alaska.

[graywarrior]

27. Thank you!

You just nailed it for me.

[crimsonblue]

22. Someday I'm going to do something similar..

albeit in my fifties, with my spouse, in Europe, with money an hotels to stay in.. but other than that, totally just like Into the Wild.

[skygazer]

23. I liked the movie but you're not an asshole for not liking it

I was struck by the same thing that XemaSab was - namely that people have this naive belief, fostered by so many years of technological innovation and living so far away from nature that they have no real comprehension of it, that they can survive on their own.

And while people do, in limited ways, at various times, people in general survive (and survived in the past) because of community.

But you know, he was a kid. I'm not sure why people expect so much sense and maturity from a kid who, from what I could see, lived a fairly privileged life and learned what he did from the people he met along the way once he was in his adulthood. I mean, some people grow up living closer to the land, hunting and so forth and so have more resources at their disposal than this kid did.

I think he did pretty well for himself considering all that. And I also think it was more a string of bad luck that did him in, rather than any particular stupidity on his part. That's usually the case - a poor decision combined with poor luck. Which can happen to anyone.

He was a kid.

What did sort of make me chuckle wryly though was the fact that throughout the movie, a point was hammered home about how awful his parents were and yet they were looking for him and worried sick about him. I disappeared for weeks or even months at a time starting when I was 15 and no one in my family ever even noticed I was gone, let alone looked for me.

[Xipe Totec]

24. yes...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=552NcxKHufY

[graywarrior]

28. *snort*

I consider that a compliment.

[Xipe Totec]

29. Of course it's a compliment,

You're a Masshole!

:loveya:

[graywarrior]

30. Best accomplishment of my life and I had no say in the matter!

I lurve us Massholes!
:evilgrin:

[Jade Fox]

31. I'm going to watch it tonight......

I'll have to get back to you re: the asshole question. ;)

[jumptheshadow]

32. He took a lot of risks

From the very start of the trip he took risks. He drove into off-limits land in Arizona and got wiped out in a flood. He almost died on that dangerous raft trip to Mexico. He was in love with the idea of breaking rules and living dangerously.

[applegrove]

33. I felt exactly the same way about the book. I was so frustrated with that kid. Needless death.