Wild Analysis

Wild (2014)

Directed by: Jean-Marc Vallee
Starring: Reese Witherspoon, Laura Dern
Screenplay by: Nick Hornby
Based on the book of the same name. 

It's a travel film. A woman decides to take a 1000-mile hike after a lot of personal trauma to redeem herself. The film has a beautiful narrative/editing style - it shows us her hike and it seamlessly cuts back to her past experiences to show us how she ended up here. No wonder the film is also edited by the director, for such a strong voice the editing has. These cuts to the flashback could be entire chunks of scenes, or even shots for a few seconds but they are designed in a way that they convey the feeling. Whether it's quick shots of Cheryl having drugs, and sex with random people - or a shot of her mother in her childhood - the choice of placement of the edits - they happen so seamlessly. Though the film isn't blatant and on the face about the narrative style, like that of a Scorsese's film or a Truffaut film - but the desirable emotional effect is achieved. Jean-Marc Vallee's films have that voice where the films almost don't have a visible stylistic approach, but there is a slight sense of style that I can feel with this film, Dallas Buyers Club and Demolition. 

The strangers she encounters and the places she goes to, they are well done. I'm wondering why travel films explore pain a lot - even Nomadland was exploring the loss of loved ones thematically, and even this film. The conversation with her mother, where she talks about how she is more sophisticated and her mom says that was her plan to have her kids more sophisticated than her - such a beautiful conversation it was. I was wondering if it'll lead to something - it does. The healing isn't too on the face, where people tell her about dealing with death or moving on - it's more visual and something which you experience with the character.