WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE
EVERYONE'S been asking me if I've seen the Where the Wild Things Are trailer, and what do I think of it?
I've seen it guys. And I think it's the shit!
For reals though I mean this movie is so loaded for me that it can only disappoint, but I'm trying to keep my expectations down on the earth:
*Directed by Spike Jonze
*Script by Dave Eggers
*Puppetry by Jim Henson Studios
*Starring Forrest Whitaker et al. badasses
Yes, I mean it sounds good, great. But as many of us know, it has so far been rapt with turmoil. Essentially there was a schism between the filmmakers (Jonze) and the distributor (Warner Bros.) regarding the 'direction' of the film.
Where the Wild Things Are was slated for an October 2008 release, but was delayed an entire year after pre-screenings had come off as "too dark/ too scary" to the children watching. Or so goes the story. Also, it is rumored that Warner Bros. was pushing hard for the cheaper computer-generated monsters while Jonze wanted live-action/ puppetry. So until the trailer was released, out of nowhere, many of us assumed the movie was dead.
Essentially I think Warner was thinking more 'blockbuster' while Spike Jonze was thinking more 'Spike Jonze.' A copy of the 111-page script was leaked to New York Daily News (the original book is 10 sentences long) and journalists there, while mostly tight-lipped, wrote only that the script was "really, really good."
From the trailer, it looks like Spike Jonze won his battle.
I mean, let's be honest here, this thing is straight art-house. It has the freaking Arcade Fire for it's song. The dark colors, the crying monsters, the absent mother, the morose Max, this stuff looks heavy. It communicated a lot in these few minutes, and Max is on a deep trip here. One shot, in particular, where Max is sailing to the monster island, in what looks like a toy boat through what looks like a real ocean storming--that could sum of the difference in tone between, perhaps, the original book and this film.
Which brings me to my thesis, if you will. Maurice Sendak's original children's book has been read by tens of millions of people through the generations and languages. Not just read, but like revered, lived, taken. No matter what this movie is, it will upset huge, huge numbers of people. Part of the beauty of the picture book is its ability to morph into what each reader wants it to be. It's ten sentences long and what is it really saying? People still argue about it. The coming of age? The loss of innocence? Anger?
What degree you read into those original darker undertones will inform how you interpret the movie, which is...emotionally poignant.
Visually, this looks stunning. Safe to say nothing in this style, on this scale, has been attempted before. The monsters have the feel of traditional human puppetry but are seen doing James Bond style live action and stunts. The backdrops seem to be a mixture of the Australian wilderness where it was filmed and huge, otherworldly CGI monuments. The scenes are beautiful to the eye, which is one of the benefits of having a music video director in a movie; they are masters of visual captivity and know how to make something pop in three seconds.
This movie will all come down to narrative, but I think this trailer is a huge success and I won't hide that it gave me chills the first time I saw it. It looks amazing and seeing it makes me really happy they took another year to make it the right way, whatever that meant.
