'Into the Wild' movie would have made Steinbeck, Kerouac and London proud

I watched a really good movie the other night that I think many of you would enjoy watching, “Into the Wild.”

Released in September 2007, this movie is the film adaptation of Jon Krakauer’s 1996 book of the same name, which spent over two years on the best-sellers lists. The book and the movie give us the story of Christopher McCandless, who began the life of a wanderer soon after his graduation from Emory University in Atlanta in 1990.

He donated his $25,000 in life savings to charity, abandoned his beloved Datsun car and changed his name to “Alexander Supertramp.” Moose hunters would find his dead body deep in the Alaskan wilderness in September 1992.

Months earlier, in April 1992, McCandless is believed to have entered the Alaskan wilderness with only 10 pounds of rice, a .22 caliber rifle, a few boxes of ammo, a camera and a few books. He’s believed to have survived on his own for about 100 days before dying of still unexplained causes, but most likely from starvation.

The film version of “Into the Wild” was directed and produced by Hollywood legend Sean Penn. Emile Hirsch starred in the role of McCandless. Others in the movie were William Hurt, Vince Vaughn, Kristen Stewart, Marcia Gay Harden and Jena Malone.

I don’t consider it a spoiler to tell you that McCandless dies in the end, since it’s mentioned on most of the promotional material, and I only bring that up here to say that the movie is not all doom and gloom.

The movie has a strong John Steinbeck/Jack Kerouac/Jack London feel too it, and portions of the movie show McCandless doing some pretty awesome things. He survives a flashflood, lives with hippies, works for a contract grain harvester, learns to dress and preserve wild game, kayaks the Colorado River down into Mexico, crosses back into the U.S. on foot, hops a freight train, befriends a lonely Army vet and learns leatherwork among other adventures.

One of the things that made this movie remarkable was its soundtrack. I don’t comment on movie soundtracks often, but this one was especially good. Pearl Jam lead singer Eddie Vedder and singer-songwriter, Jerry Hannan performed the songs on the soundtrack, and Vedder would go on to win a Best Original Song Golden Globe Award in 2008 for the song, “Guaranteed.” Some of the songs gave me chills they were so good.

The movie, which is longer than most at nearly 2-1/2 hours, was shot on a budget of around $15 million. It posted box office revenues of over $56 million.

This movie has also made me want to check out some of Krakauer’s other books. Some of the other books he’s written include “Eiger Dreams: Ventures Among Men and Mountain” (1990), “Into Thin Air” (1997), “Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith” (2003), “Where Men Win Glory: The Odyssey of Pat Tillman” (2009) and “Three Cups of Deceit” (2011).

In the end, I really enjoyed this movie, and I’m planning to read the book version of it soon. How many of you have seen “Into the Wild”? What did you think about it? How many of you have read the book? Did you like it or not? Let us know in the comments section below.