Movie Talk: Where the Wild Things Are

I'm puzzled, slightly perturbed, and a little bit intrigued.

Apparently someone has decided to make a feature length live action motion picture out of that beloved childhood bedtime tome "Where the Wild Things Are".

I'm puzzled since I'm wondering how they could make a full movie out of a picture book which is like 12 pages long and has fewer words than this post is likely to have. The plot is razor thin: boy gets sent to bed, boy has dream, boy conquers wild things, boy wakes up and magically his supper is still warm.

Naturally I'm not too shocked to learn about the project since I know Hollywood has done more with less source material, though by "more" I don't mean that what they made was good, simply that they were able to fill two hours of celluloid with it. Which brings me to feeling perturbed, because I just know that in order to pad out this story the filmmakers are going to have to invent all sorts of new things and cram them into the story, a practice which rarely succeeds except in defiling the source material. I was curious about just what they were planning to do to make this a movie, so I tracked down the trailer. Let's have a look.



I'm... a little bit intrigued. Not in the sense that I'm going to see this film. I likely won't. But I'm intrigued at the way this trailer seems to market this film. From what I can gather it seems like a standard lonely escapist kid movie. Kid is alienated and sad, kid creates a fantasy world and has some adventure, kid eventually grows up (or not) and has his still hot supper. Makes sense.

But what's with all the indie music? Kids movie's are typically very wordy in their advertising, laying out the plot points and characters easily in order to real kids in. And they almost always end with that most annoying of trailer cliches "The Adventure of a Lifetime!". God I hate that phrase in a trailer.

I'm curious as to what this trailer is trying to do. Few words, adult music, stylized editing. It has a very hip-ish, indie film flavor to it. Is this an attempt to reel in older people (and hip 25ish somethings) who fondly remember the book from their childhoods? Is this actually not a kids movie but rather escapist fare for adults?

My money is that it is, in fact, a kid's movie. But in order to maximize their audience the advertisers figured that they had to grab the parents. Most of said parents will remember the book and will thus be happily inclined to take their offspring, subconsciously hoping to revive a bit of happy childhood in the process. Its likely also aimed at bringing in the childless but nostalgic who need an excuse to go see a kids movie which they really want to see. Its probably a good marketing idea.