Ahlam EL-Zubeidi - Critical Essay 2

Into The Wild - Sean Penn

        The movie making industry is based on visual images firstly and then other aesthetics that might be considered secondary to support the images, while not degrading the importance of other elements in movies such as, lighting, sound, motion, etc, images make up a movie. Images are the base of every movie ever made. For instance the first movie that was made was silent and was based for the most part on images and using music to intensify the effect of those images, indicating that images have a far more powerful effect on the storyline, for through an image you can tell a story.

The movie into the wild is based on a true story, the picture below, the gist of the story is told:

           The movie Into the Wild, was released in 2007. Director Sean Penn pays an immense importance for images and visualization. “Into the Wild delivers his journey to your senses. It's an intensely physical movie, yet it's never just physical. Every image (rivers, highways, icy mountains) tells its own story” (Gleiberman, Para 4). The movie starts with a picture of Christopher McCandless played by Emile Hirsch whom the story of the movie revolves mainly around, in a frame on a night stand, thus giving the audience an introduction to the character we only here a voice that says the word “mom” over and over, relating that voice to said picture shows us that the voice must belong to Christopher. Then his mother Carine McCandless played by Jena Malone wakes up from a nightmare calling her sons name and that gives the audience more information about the character they are about to meet. The point here is that at first we were given a face for it is easier to remember than a name and then we were given his name. In that scene the camera focuses on the picture of Christopher then the picture becomes hazy, indicating the emotional disturbance at that moment because while looking at the picture we see that Christopher is smiling then the picture blurs to show that the smiling face is not something that describes that moment, that it is the total opposite, it is in fact a sad moment. Then the camera zooms out to follow the mom’s movement as she sits up by focusing on the mother and using a medium shot. During that whole scene the camera is subjective as to bring the viewer closer to the interaction and making them become closer emotionally to the character. Also there was an over-the-shoulder shot to focus on the mother’s actions rather than the father’s for in that moment she’s the one we should be paying attention to. The lighting in that scene was dark with fast falloff on the mothers face and with a dark background and selective illumination making it chiaroscuro lighting making the scene dramatic and emotionally “dark”.
          

The fact that the story of the movie is sad it doesn’t stop Penn from achieving the purpose of making images turn the story in a different direction to view it as more joyful. In The New York Times Scott pointed that out by saying “But though the film’s structure may be tragic, its spirit is anything but. It is infused with an expansive, almost giddy sense of possibility, and it communicates a pure, unaffected delight in open spaces, fresh air and bright sunshine.” (Scott, Para 1). Penn also assisted in the camerawork field “Mr. Penn, who did some of the camera work, was aided by the director of photography, Eric Gautier, who previously turned his careful, voracious eye on the wilds of South America” (Scott, Para 5) and that is why we see a lot of experimenting with the camerawork while also making pictures of the landscapes and such tell the story for Gautier had a previous experience with filming the wilds.

To sum it all up, just by taking a few scenes from a movie, one realizes the big role images play to convey a message, after all, movies are made up of raw images at first, that are later polished, edited and fixed. it all comes down to the power of an image. 

·         “Following His Trail to Danger and Joy.” The New York Times. 2007. movies.nytimes.com. 14 Nov. 2010 http://movies.nytimes.com/2007/09/21/movies/21wild.html?n=Top/Reference/Times%20Topics/People/H/Hirsch,%20Emile

·          “Into The Wild.” Entertainment Weekly. 2007. ew.com. 13 Nov. 2010 http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20057690,00.html

·          “Into The Wild” Internet Movie Data Base. 2007. imdb.com. 14 Nov.2010 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0758758/