I'm glad I waited to see Into the Wild on DVD. That way I avoided the embarrassment of shrieking and bawling my eyes out in the cinema. Always a good thing.I agree with Margaret Pomeranz; this movie is almost a masterpiece.
Christopher McCandless has been described in many places as a schizophrenic. It's an interesting summation. Who knows? Perhaps he was. He displays a few schizophrenic tendencies, but I doubt the diagnosis. Really, our society is apt to medicalise and diagnose anything anyone does which is not stock-standard docility (all the better to medicate you with). In another age he would have been considered courageous and brave - and he was. He was also obviously running away. But hey, running away isn't all bad and naughty and negative and irresponsible. Sometimes running away is good, 'cause oftentimes when you're running away you're also running to growth and new experiences and life. It's called having adventures. But really, if you're going to be very safe and sure, you could always have then packaged up by an approved company that will fit them into a nice little white-water-rafting two-week holiday for you. Just to be on the safe side.
I most certainly have a romantic turn of mind and so this guy appealed to me enormously, issues of mental health aside (I suggest we are all perilously close to mental illness at points in our lives, anyway and that's always been the case down through the ages).
I was daydreaming before while I was doing the dishes about the vegetable oil-powered campervan again. It's a recurring dream. I was wondering how I could grow my own vegetables if I was driving around in a van. I came up with the idea of bolting pots to the roof and growing them that way. Which would look really stupendously Devo-ishly Bill-and-Bennishly dumb. But at least I'd be eating healthy :)
I've got an urge to watch this movie again and I've just seen it. I highly recommend it if you haven't already seen it. Afterwards, I'll meet you on the road :) I'll be the one driving the vegetable oil-powered campervan with vegetables on its roof. You can call me Susie Rubbertramp.
