Stunning scenery, brilliant directing from Sean Penn, soulful songs from Eddie Vedder, and a remarkable, true story. Christopher McCandless (Emile Hirsch) is a college graduate from an affluent upbringing who decides to abandon his possessions and money and to live life out on the road, ala Jack London or Jack Kerouac during parts of their lives. He's a fascinating character because of his idealism and his nonconformity; he's intelligent and kind, and yet he doesn't value human relationships, preferring solitude and a deep connection to nature. Hirsch plays the part very well, displaying an easy, personable warmth but at the same time a determination to go his own way, damn the consequences. He also really looks the part, including scenes where he had to lose quite a bit of weight. His character is troubled from an upbringing that was riddled with strife, and in one moments says so simply (and sadly) "Some people feel like they don't deserve love. They walk away quietly into empty spaces, trying to close the gaps of the past," and yet we get the feeling that is just one aspect of a complicated and yet simple guy.

I think some people are turned off by what they feel was a glorification, but I didn't feel that way at all. We see the trail of tears he leaves behind him, with his parents and sister devastated by not hearing from him, and him ignoring some of the kindly advice he receives along the way. He is also brutal to an old man (Hal Holbrook) who so very generously offers to adopt him, in what is a fantastic scene. Holbrook is also brilliant when he tells the young man "when you forgive, you love." We see him take risks which pay off (kayaking down a rampaging river), and of course others which do not (going into the true wild of Alaska without a map or enough preparation). For that he is sometimes vilified or mocked, but I admired him for not conforming like the rest of us, and for living life on his own terms. He certainly was not cheated. And in the end, he has his moment of realization, that "happiness (is) only real when shared", which is a moment that is incredibly poignant.

I loved the literary references in the film, starting with the title card quoting Byron, which seems so perfect: "There is a pleasure in the pathless woods; / There is a rapture on the lonely shore; / There is society, where none intrudes, / By the deep sea, and music in its roar; / I love not man the less, but Nature more..."

And at the end as I thought about McCandless's life, I thought that this passage from Thoreau was nowhere more suitable: "Why should we be in such desperate haste to succeed, and in such desperate enterprises? If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away."

I come away from this movie somewhat conflicted, not about the picture itself but of it's principal character, Christopher McCandless. I say that with some reservation as well, because when I was his age and fresh out of college, I spent a lot of time steeped in existentialist thought trying to figure out the meaning of life and how to conduct my own. In McCandless's case, there was also the family dysfunction at work, something that I never had to contend with growing up.

At the heart of the movie, I don't have a lot of problem with Chris's philosophy of "If you want something in life, reach out and grab it". The paradox in that statement occurred exactly at the time he was saying those words to guitarist Tracy (Kristen Stewart) who fell hard for Chris at the traveler's camp. She was 'reaching out to grab it' and things weren't going to work out for her in quite the same way. So life has it's way of throwing those kinds of curveballs at you.

No doubt some will find the message of uninhibited freedom and life without constraints to be an appealing one, but in the final analysis, doesn't the mere fact of existence require one to do the prudent thing? Chris McCandless's death was so unnecessary. Chances are, had he gone on to live say, a full five or ten years in the wild, he might have come to an entirely different conclusion about the meaning of his life and how to be a productive citizen of the world. His reading of Tolstoy offered a clue to an acceptable view of happiness - work which may be of some use, rest, nature, books and music. Loneliness didn't seem to be part of that equation.