By Annie Hays, Staff Writer
After a while action movies and romantic comedies can get tiresome and boring, and movie-goers need something different. “Wild,” directed by Jean-Marc Vallée, is a movie that feels completely different from anything else in theaters, and has a strong female lead. It is very graphic, but the story grips the audience from start to finish.
The movie begins with a bang as Cheryl Strayed (Reese Witherspoon) loses her hiking boot on top of a steep mountain and angrily screams down into a ravine. This begins the series of flashbacks that tell the story of Cheryl’s difficult life. The flashbacks come randomly and are not in chronological order, so the movie is difficult to follow at first. Eventually the audience is able to connect the dots and realize that Cheryl had an absent, abusive father (Jason Newell) whom her mother (Laura Dern) had to escape from. When Cheryl is a young woman her mother dies, and Cheryl becomes an addict and prostitute. She has been wanting to hike the Pacific Crest Trail her entire life, so in order to heal from her past mistakes she hikes the 1,000 mile trail from the Mojave Desert to Western Canada.
The movie definitely earned its “R” rating due to the explicit drug use, sex scenes, and cursing. However, the difficult flashbacks that Cheryl is plagued with are cut with stunning scenes of the trail. The contrast between memories of shooting heroin and hiking through spring mountain meadows keeps the movie moving at a fast and exciting pace. Unlike the flashbacks, the hiking scenes are in chronological order to stabilize the movie timeline.
Another stark contrast in the movie is the intense sadness and heartbreak Cheryl endures, and the stark humor in the movie. An early scene where Cheryl is trying to hoist up her unbelievably heavy pack for the first time is absolutely hysterical, especially since Witherspoon is such a petit woman.
The movie had strong feminist overtones, as Cheryl is able to overcome so much adversity and hike the Pacific Crest Trail as a lone woman. As a woman walking that trail, Cheryl has to be on guard for some less-than-savory male characters, and these scenes add even more believable drama to the plot.
The most refreshing part of the movie is its “realness.” It is based off of a memoir by the real Cheryl Strayed, and no punches were pulled in making this movie. The raw anguish displayed by Witherspoon feels genuine, the realities of not showering or eating a home-cooked meal on the trail are shown, and the consequences of drug use are on full-display.
This movie is a must see for anyone who has been through hardships in his/her life, enjoys hiking, or just wants to see a great movie. I give this a 5/5.
