Where the Wild Things Are | Eastern North Carolina Now

    
I know this Will Anger Some, But the Movie Did Not Need to be Made

    I do try to give films a good go of it when I try to enjoy them as art or simply entertainment. In terms of "Where the Wild Things Are," I tried to look at the picture trough the eyes of an unruly child, but I came up empty. The movie was 101 minutes long and was about 60 minutes too long to tell the story of the unruly Max in a make-believe-world that originated from a short, but very interestingly illustrated book by Maurice Sendak. I liked the book, read to my children. I did not particularly like the movie. As a movie it really did not need to be made.

    I really did like the quirky "Being John Malkovich," another film made by the "Where the Wild Things Are" Director Spike Jonze, but he had a script by Charlie Kaufman to make that film. This time out, Mr. Jonze and David Eggers wrote the screenplay and Director Jonze did himself no favors, but once again, how does one develop a children's very short story into a feature length film? Obviously, it was beyond Director and Screenplay Writer Jonze to put together a film worth making.

    The Director had suitable actors' voices: James Gandolfini as Carol, Lauren Ambrose as K.W, Paul Dano Alexander, Catherine O'Hara as Judith, Chris Cooper as Douglas, Michael Berry Jr. as The Bull and Forest Whitaker. The voice actors were good enough, but the dialogue in the script was so weak it was of little consequence. Catherine Keener as Max's mom and Mark Ruffalo as her boyfriend had too small of roles to be of any effect upon the final product. The role of Max was played by new actor Max Records, who was competent enough of showing me how an obnoxious kid operates in his real world and also in his very strong fantasy world, but at some point (I believe near the beginning of the film), I just did not care anymore.

    If you loved the book and don't mind probably wasting the 101 minutes it took to tell this boring tale, rent the DVD.

    Rated PG. Released on DVD March 2, 2010.



    This article provided courtesy of our sister site: Better Angels Now