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In Spike Jonze’s big screen adaptation of the much beloved classic children’s picture book Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak, he takes many liberties to expand the few sentences of the book into a full length film. Instead of only “making mischief of one kind and another,” Max (Max Records) has serious reason to act out. His mother (Catherine Keener) has begun seeing a new boyfriend (Mark Ruffalo), and it is obvious by his actions that Max needs a father figure. Max’s older sister is too busy hanging out with her friends to play with him in the snow so he plays by himself. In a particularly heartbreaking scene, one of his sister’s friends crushes his carefully made snow fort by jumping on top of it, with Max inside. Max acts out one night by wearing his wolf suit and screaming insults at his mother.
Hurt and confused, he runs out of the house “and an ocean tumbles by with a private boat for Max, and he sailed off through night and day and in and out of weeks and almost over a year to where the wild things are.” In the book, the wild things are pretty frightening looking. They tower over Max and have various horns, hoofs, and claws. In the movie, they are just the same. They threaten to eat Max up, until Max proves that he can be scary and becomes the king of all wild things. The Wild Things of the movie mirror the characters of Max’s real life. Carol (James Gandolfini) is Max, wild and unruly and unsure of himself. KW (Lauren Ambrose) is Max’s sister, who is trying to find herself in other ways and finds her friends more interesting than her family. Judith (Catherine O’Hara) is a pessimistic leader who is also unsure of what she needs to do. Alexander (Paul Dano) represents another side of Max, the lonely, scared side.
Carol and Max have the best chemistry, and some of the best scenes occur when the two are discovering and talking. KW though has some very tender scenes with Max, and it is obvious in talking with her that Max looks up to his big sister greatly. But as tender as Jonze treats childhood, the film is not completely perfect. As a film experience, it can seem a bit unresolved. There is really no climax, no typical storyline. Max simply goes to the wild things, experiences things, builds things, then goes home. He doesn’t even really go on a journey that ends with him figuring things out. Like any kid, he just knows that he misses his family and wants to go home. Jonze has succeeded in every way with his adaptation of Where the Wild Things Are. He kept it simple, honest, and has captured a part of childhood that most grown-ups don’t remember, or don’t want to remember.
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