Wild

 WILD

Director : Jean - Marc Vallee

Year : 2015

Genre : Biographical Drama

Rating : ***1/2

 

After earning critical and commercial success with the Academy Award nominated 'Dallas Buyers Club' director Jean- Marc Vallee once again vies for Oscar glory with 'Wild' , an enthralling yet uninspired biographical drama starring Reese Witherspoon and Laura Dern. Adapted by Nick Hornby from the best selling autobiography 'Wild : From Lost To Found On The Pacific Crest Trail' by Cheryl Strayed, the movie tells the true story about a psychologically damaged woman who, after the death of her mother, embarks on a life changing hike across the entire west side of the United States in an attempt to confront and defeat her many personal and emotional battles.

Told with the eye of a director working at the absolute top of his game, Vallee deftly switches from the mundane to the hallucinatory - interspersing Strayeds life-changing journey with Malick-esque flashbacks to paint a rather tragic picture of a girl whose environment and situations have shaped the way she leads her life. In these flashbacks, we bear witness to her traumatic childhood at the hands of her abusive father, the life and death of her beloved mother (played by a wonderful Laura Dern) and her doomed marriage and eventual divorce. All of these scenes pack serious emotional heft and it is thanks to both Vallees direction and Witherspoons astonishing performance that 'Wild' becomes something rather special. Just Ashe did with McConaughey and Leto in 'Dallas Buyers Club', Vallee manages to bring out a raw intensity and palpable truth from a bruised and bloodied Reese Witherspoon who gives her best performance since her Academy Award winning turn in 'Walk The Line'.

Unfortunately, as is the case with another Oscar darling 'Foxcatcher', 'Wild' is a movie that relies more on it's performances than its story-telling to bring an audience in. While its direction is crisp and the script perfectly echoes the emotionality of the narrative, the film isn't particularly memorable when compared to other movies of it's ilk such as Sean Penns' similarly titled 'Into The Wild', Alfonso Cuarons' 'The Road' and especially David Lynchs' 'The Straight Story' and apart from Witherspoon and Dern who do deliver deep resonance to their roles, 'Wild' surprisingly fails where 'Dallas Buyers Club' so beautifully succeeded.