hal holbrook Tagged Articles at Cinematical

The conventional wisdom regarding Sean Penn's justly acclaimed rendering of Into the Wild is that the film is "faithful" to the Jon Krakauer book. This is utterly cracked, and the misconception is illustrative of my staunch "books are not movies" philosophy. Not only is Into the Wild not "faithful" to the book, but it couldn't possibly have been faithful and remain a narrative film. Sure, it dutifully replicates what Krakauer was able to discover about Chris McCandless' adventure – most of the supporting characters, destinations and events are here, and some lines of dialogue are lifted from Krakauer's account. If that's all it takes for a movie to be "faithful," then I guess it's faithful. But that ignores the fact that the book and the film were trying to accomplish fundamentally different things, and went about it in fundamentally different ways.

Krakauer's book – which, by the way, is a national treasure – is first journalistic, and then philosophical. The author did painstaking research to piece together the details of McCandless' journey and death from interviews, personal observations, and Chris's own writings. What emerged probably wasn't what Krakauer, who obviously sympathizes and identifies with his hero, would have preferred: the picture of McCandless his sources paint is that of a young man who is bright and curious, but also inconsiderate, arrogant, and often downright unpleasant. (The letter he wrote to "Ron Franz," Hal Holbrook's character in the film, haranguing the octogenarian to sell his possessions and go on the road, is painful to read.)

The big indie DVD release this week is Sean Penn's cinematic version of the true-life adventure story Into the Wild, starring Emile Hirsch and Hal Holbrook. But there are several other intriguing new titles that you might have missed during their theatrical engagements, starting with Susanne Bier's Things We Lost in the Fire. By our usual definitions, it's not really an "indie," since it was released by a big Hollywood studio (Paramount Pictures), but I think Bier's distinctive directorial vision is the very definition of "independent." It's certainly not an easy film to watch or to like, yet the performance by Benicio del Toro is a knock out and I think a rental is justified. The DVD includes deleted scenes and a discussion about the film.

When he saw My Kid Could Paint That at Sundance, Scott Weinberg wrote: "I love a documentary that doles out both sides of an interesting story and then forces you to decide for yourself where the truth actually lies." Directed by Amir Bar-Lev, the documentary tells the story of a four-year-old girl who may -- or may not -- be an immensely talented artist. Sony Pictures Classics' DVD includes an audio commentary and two behind-the-scenes features.

An intimate drama that divided festival audiences, Chilean filmmaker Matías Bize's En La Cama (In Bed) sets all the action in a single motel room as a man and a woman alternately have passionate sex and engage in spirited debates. This sounds like a couples film -- as long as the couple is comfortable watching softcore porn together. Koch Lorber's DVD includes deleted scenes, a bonus interview, rehearsals, TV spots, and a short film by the director.

For some horrible reason Josh Brolin continues to be left out of the awards season party this year, despite his terrific performances in No Country for Old Men, American Gangster and In the Valley of Elah (he was also in Planet Terror, the Robert Rodriguez half of Grindhouse). All I can say is that I hope he continues to be offered great roles and never has to go back to being in movies like Hollow Man and Into the Blue. Meanwhile, his No Country co-stars Javier Bardem and Tommy Lee Jones have been nominated for Screen Actors Guild awards for their supporting roles. Bardem's presence in the category is not surprising -- he's the front-runner for the supporting Oscar, isn't he? -- but it's great to Jones here, since he's been ignored by the Golden Globes, the Golden Satellites and pretty much everything else.

Another surprise with the SAG nominees is Ryan Gosling as best actor for Lars and the Real Girl, beating possible contenders Johnny Depp, Denzel Washington, Phillip Seymour Hoffman (also missing from the supporting category) and Tom Hanks. Also, there's sweet little old Ruby Dee in the supporting actress race for having the cutest reaction to being given a mansion (and for later putting Denzel in his place) in American Gangster. She goes up against the usual 2007 supporting actress contenders Cate Blanchett, Amy Ryan and Tilda Swinton, as well as somewhat surprising addition Catherine Keener, who helped to make Into the Wild the top receiver of nominations with four -- others include Emile Hirsch, Hal Holbrook and ensemble cast. Other ensemble casts nominated include those of Hairspray (no single acting noms), 3:10 to Yuma (no single acting noms), No Country for Old Men, and American Gangster. Very, very, very surprisingly left out of this category is Juno (Ellen Page is nominated for best actress, however).

This year the SAG Awards are introducing two new categories. They are both for best stunt ensemble, one for film and one for television. The film category features nominees The Bourne Identity, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, I Am Legend, 300 and The Kingdom. The rest of the motion picture nominees and categories can be found after the jump or over on Moviefone.

One of the most polarizing films playing at Telluride this year was Into the Wild. Directed and written by Sean Penn off the book of the same name by Jon Krakauer, the film follows the coming-of-age journey of Christopher McCandless, who "dropped out" shortly after graduating with honors from Emory College and walked off into the wilderness. After giving his $24,000 college fund to charity, and burning his drivers license, social security card and credit cards, McCandless set out on a spiritual quest to rebirth himself outside the context of materialism and societal definitions of "success." It's an admirable enough cause for a young person, especially in this age when there's so much focus on the materialistic success and what that means, and there's certainly a deeper philosophical question at the heart of McCandless' journey, but the choices McCandless makes along his journey will make the audience question his motives.

What is success, really, and what is happiness, and can you have one without the other? McCandless and his sister Carine, at least as the film tells their story, grew up with all the accoutrements of what upper middle class society would deem necessary for a happy, fulfilled life: a nice house to live in, parents who dress nice and drive fancy cars, a college fund to pay for school, his own car (a crappy Datsun he bought and paid for himself), enough food to eat, nice clothes to wear. He also, according to the story and the voiceover narration by Carine (Jena Malone), had parents who lied about their relationship (they met when his dad was still married to another woman, with whom he had a son -- something Chris found out about when he was older but never told his parents he knew), fought constantly and violently, and frequently put their children at the center of their battlles and constant threats of divorce.