Will Sorg

Maurice Sendak’s classic children’s book Where The Wild Things Are has been a central book in the lives of American children since its release in 1963. It is a simple, yet deeply engaging picture book about a rowdy young boy named Max who travels to an island filled with monsters, known as Wild Things. Sendak tried to adapt the book into a film several times, first as an animated film made by Walt Disney Animation Studios which never made it past a screen test. In the early 2000s, Universal Studios acquired the rights to adapt the book, and after several years of pre-production, uncertainty, and another
production switch to Warner Brothers, Spike Jonze was personally selected by Sendak to adapt the ten sentence, forty page children’s book into a feature length film.
In the end, Jonze and Sendak decided to not make a children’s film out of the book. Instead a film about childhood was made; it depicts all of the experiences that happen during that period of our lives, the good and the bad. It isn’t just happy romps around the forest with eight foot tall monsters, although this film has that in spades. It is also about
loneliness, anger, confusion and sadness. Those moments in your childhood where you begin to realize that your parents or siblings aren’t perfect, that sometimes you can be selfish or hurt other people through your actions and that has consequences. We see Max escape to the island of The Wild Things not just as a fun moment of escapism, but also because being a kid is overwhelming. As he discovers the complexity of the world he decides to try and run away to a place where he can be king, where he can build giant forts with his big, tough, hairy monster friends, where he can play with them all he wants and they can all sleep on a big pile of each other.
Yet it becomes abundantly clear that the island is not free of the realities of life either. The Wild Things are growing apart from each other. Disagreements and bitter grudges are pulling apart their strange little family. This distancing is even manifested in the island by an encroaching desert that has been slowly destroying the island. It may seem a little silly to think that a film about a little kid running around with a bunch of monsters could be one of the most honest and emotional depictions of friendship, familial dysfunction and growing up, but I have been moved to tears both times I have seen this film and I will likely cry the next time I see it as well.
This is a rare film that is able to reignite that wonderful energy of childhood while also managing to be deeply in tune with the emotions of both children and adults. So if you have an hour and forty minutes to spare, check it out on Swank. It truly is a wild time.