Where The Wild Things Are — A Movie Review

Earlier in the week, I made plans to spend Sunday afternoon enjoying a nice relaxing drive up the canyon to see the pretty fall colors with the family. It started off great, but by midway through the drive my nice family outing had disintegrated into fighting, hurt feelings, and everyone in the car looking for the nearest exit.  If the car hadn’t been moving so fast, I think we all might have bailed. In that moment, I felt a little bit like Max in the book “Where The Wild Things Are,” by Maurice Sendak. All I wanted to do was sail away and never come back. However, the chaos soon passed, and 30 minutes later we were out shopping for TVs together as if nothing had ever happened. Figure that one out.

That’s the thing about families, I guess. They can be so hard to live with sometimes, but they can be so hard to live without as well. The movie “Where The Wild Things Are,” directed by Spike Jonze, expounds upon this theme. Max is a lonely kid. He doesn’t have any friends, and his family is busy and involved in their own lives. His mother is single and is just trying to hold it all together. After a wild confrontation with his mother, Max sails away as far and as fast as he can.

When his boat finally hits land, Max becomes friends with the wild things in his strange new world. He even becomes their king.  However, Max also discovers that the wild things have their own family issues, just like Max’s family. The wild things think that by making Max their king he will be able to magically make them happy. But Max soon finds, despite his best efforts, that he cannot make all of the other wild things happy, at least not all of them, and certainly not all of the time. I think he then begins to understand his mother and sister a little better.

Relationships can be tricky, and often none are so difficult as those with our own families. We may want to bail and look for something better elsewhere, but I think we might find, like Max did, another family overflowing with their own issues and wild things to spare.

This is an excellent movie. I especially loved the characters, the music, and the setting. I don’t think it’s for everyone though. In fact, the two children sitting behind me appeared quite disappointed, and I heard the little girl in the seat behind mine ask her mommy, “Why did it end so sad?” As an adult, I enjoyed the film quite a bit, and I didn’t think it ended sadly at all.  However, I think it may take some age to see beyond the sadness and conflict to the real treasure beneath.

I’d love to hear your thoughts. Have you seen the movie? Did you like it? Would you take your kids to see it?