I always get really nervous whenever my favorite childhood books are turned into movies. Hollywood has a habit of destroying my childhood. One memory I have is of seeing the Golden Compass and leaving the theater in tears because it had been so bad.
So I was a little afraid when I bought my ticket for Where the Wild Things are, even though it's been so long since I read the book that the only sentence I remember is, "LET THE WILD RUMPUS BEGIN," and to be honest I remembered it because it was a Facebook bumper sticker.
When the music by Karen O began, however, and Max began to dig around in the snow nostalgia was stirred up in me. When he slid belly-first into the ice cave, immersed in a private blue-glowing world, I thought, yeah, this is childhood.
And for all of its plot problems-none of the Wild Thing's problems reaching any kind of denouement being the major one-that is the movie's greatest quality. The high-energy music and the creation of a richly unique world brought me back to a time in my life when imagination was for its own pure creative enjoyment, and not something to marketed.
The scene that stands out as a perfect moment was not even from the book but particular to Spike Jonez's creation. It's when Max sticks his head into the world Carol has created out of sticks, perfect mountains painted and little clay figurines, and he pours water that rushes towards Max but at the last moment slides around. The quiet, miniature moment was crystalline and beautiful and entirely Jonez's own.
So yeah, thanks Spike Jonez for not stomping on my childhood. And I really mean that.
-Alyssa
