Long walk into the wilderness

Rating: 8/10 (12 January 2009)

Hands up if you watched this film and identified yourself with high-flying college graduate Chris McCandless (brilliantly played by Emile Hirsch). Come on, be honest, surely you've day- dreamed about having enough of a free-spirited nature to see you give up all things materialistic and head for the great outdoors where you would survive all things thrown up at you - well, haven't you? Couldn't you see yourself doing what Chris McCandless does - forsake what promised to be a glittering future career in law, give away 24,000 dollars to charity, give up the pressures of modern day Western life and hit the highway heading for his Alaskan dream. Well I for one didn't identify myself with Chris. No. I identified with his dad. played magnificently by William Hurt (he's even better here than his role in Mr Brooks, if that's possible); a dad whose inability to show his son how much he loved him ( how many dads of his generation are guilty of this?) was one of the prime reasons that Chris hit the road in the first place. The scene where William Hurt goes out into the street, looks to the heavens and offers a tearful, silent prayer for the safety of his long- gone son is heart-wrenching; would that if he had his time again he would have shown his son how much he did indeed love him. On his travels Chris does find affection among the many like-minded free spirits who offer him shelter and, in some cases work, as he makes his way to his Alaskan dream. Chris finally makes it to the snow and ice-bound wilderness where his fight with nature is stunningly directed by Penn. The truly saddening aspect of this film as it draws to an end is that it shows a man who lives his dream but comes to realise that the best things in life may be free but they are nothing if they are not shared - a lesson learnt too late by his distraught father. A memorable film.