I'm sorry...I thought I'd really like this, but no.

Rating: 3/10 (9 December 2012)

WARNING...MORE SPOILERS THAN USUAL!
Emile Hirsch plays Chris, a young man brought up rich and privileged, but he dislikes his parents, thinks they're assholes. And actually, he's right. The parents (William Hurt and Marcia Gay Harden) fight in private and project phoniness in public. Sure, they're assholes.
But instead of just moving out, getting his education, and making something of himself, he decides that society is just too sick and ugly to live among people in general. He decides that the only way to live a truthful and fulfilling life is to ditch our cash-happy rat race and live in a shitty bus up in the Great North somewhere...oh, except that he doesn't live there full time, only when the weather's tolerable.
Otherwise, he's all over the place, and frankly, I lost track of what time frame we were in, what town he was in, and lost interest in the story in general. But I watched it to the end, hoping that perhaps this very young and self righteous brat would just get this out of his system. There are better ways of "getting back" at your hated parents than roughing it in the harsh elements, eating poisonous berries, and slowly starving yourself until your body gives up the ghost.
Sean Penn's writing is sometimes pretentiously poetic and other times just plain poor. I'm sorry, because I like most of his work. This, however, just melodramatic drivel, a story that really didn't need telling.