'Where the Wild Things Are' moving, uplifting and exciting
Director: Spike Jonze
Cast: Catherine Keener, Mark Ruffalo, James Gandolfini, Max Record, Forest Whitaker
Cert: PG
If Jonze’s stunningly brilliant adaptation of Maurice Sendak’s much-loved children’s story doesn’t clean up at the next Oscars bash then we live in a cruel and unfair world.
Jonze has taken a slight story – naughty little boy Max (Record), misunderstood and largely ignored by his family, is sent to bed and there creates his own world of wild adventure and wonderful wild creatures – and without overloading it with unnecessary complications moulded it into an emotion-charged, colourful, thoughtful – sad even – journey into the mind and imagination of a 10-year-old boy.
Sendak waited until his hand-picked director, Jonze, was free to make the film and it was both an inspired choice and well worth the wait since Jonze takes all the elements of the original story and blends them into a film that is beautiful to look at as well as moving, uplifting and exciting.
You won’t find a better film doing the rounds this Yuletide.
Star Rating: 5/5
