Where The Wild Things Are

Overview

With the patience of a nine year old (that is to say, none at all), it feels that the world has been holding its breath for Spike Jonze's screen adaptation of Where The Wild Things Are. Finally, it's time to let it out with a mighty howl.

Jonze (Being John Malkovich, Adaptation) with writer Dave Eggers, has adapted Maurice Sendak's much loved 1963 children's classic (banned from many school libraries at the time) from a scant nine sentences to a feature length film. It opens triumphantly, as the main character Max, played brilliantly by newcomer Max Records, hustles and hoots and hollers, a boy aged nine doing what it is that kids do. He builds an elaborate fort of sheets, carves an igloo and you see his ecstatic self-accomplishment fade when his mother (Catherine Keener, bless her) and older sister don't pay him the attention he so craves. Manic emotion races across his face, glee and loneliness tumbling one after another, setting the tone of the rest of the film. "You're out of control!" yells his mother when Max takes a stance against the injustices of both being a kid and unwanted frozen corn, and off he races into the night to sail away to the island of the wild things. It's perfect.

It's at this point, unfortunately, that the film takes a turn. The wild things, beautifully realised in their bulky three dimensions, aren't just a little lonely or in need of leadership from their new ruler, Max. Rather, they're in need of mood stabilisers. Their angsty issues of loneliness and jealousy supposedly mirror the inner turmoil of Max â€" and, by extension viewers â€" but they step too far in "bummer" territory. "I'm a downer" says wild thing Judith at one point but she's not the only one. It's not an issue of being too mature for a children's film (it never purports to be one or the other, and nor should it), it's an issue of a too emotionally weighty screenplay. Having spent an hour and a half with the wild things on their island, one realises it's not a king they require, it's a therapist.

Aesthetically, Where The Wild Things Are is gorgeous. The Australian bush lends itself to a place where the creatures could be found roaming (they may as well be bunyips), as light filters in and out of the camera, capturing the action so vividly. The soundtrack (by Yeah Yeah Yeah's Karen O) is a little clumsily inserted, but right on in spirit, and the tone of the Max character is a complete delight. The film has the handmade quality and intimacy that Jonze so clearly was after, but it lingers too much in a kind of dragging, adult sadness that feels too overwrought for the film's inner child.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=Rhfywi5Y8TM