Show me a person like Christopher McCandless and I’ll show you someone who doesn’t exist.
Or does he? You might be hard-pressed to find someone as carefree as McCandless, the subject of Sean Penn’s “Into the Wild,” but the movie does have that whole “based on a true story” tag so I guess we have to trust the altruism. To give up a successful reputation is brave. To give up your entire savings is crazy. To go on a hitchhiking adventure is, let’s face it, a batshit idea that’s long extinct but is nonetheless admirable.
McCandless (Emile Hirsch) is an Emory grad with high ranks in athletics and academics, one of those guys you see on Who’s Who lists that make you feel a tad low on the totem pole. He slides down that pole, though, giving his entire savings to charity and going on a quest to Alaska to live in the wilderness.
Marcia Gay Harden, William Hurt and Jena Malone play the McCandless family in a star-studded cast that includes Zach Galifianakis and Bart the Bear (dude, did you see him in “Without a Paddle”? Nobody plays a bear better!). A two-disc collector’s edition DVD includes documentaries about the film’s characters and story.
“Michael Clayton”
Now on DVD
Show me a person like Michael Clayton and I’ll show you a little of yourself.
To a certain degree, we all have some Clayton in us. Expectations are riding on us to succeed each day and, when we achieve those goals amidst crushing personal blows, we’re expected to wipe the dust from our eyes and do the same thing the next day. George Clooney’s character is that to an infinite degree. Clayton handles a corporate New York law firm he’s more or less attached with despite mounting financial and family pressure. When a $3 billion case risks crumbling, the firm counts on Clayton to clean up the mess when risking his professional life and his life in general.
Additional scenes are on the DVD, as well as commentary from writer and director Tony Gilroy, the man you can thank for the “Bourne” trilogy.
“Kurt Cobain: About a Son”
Now on DVD
Everyone else has been telling Kurt Cobain’s story. It’s about time he tells it himself.
People claim to understand the Nirvana frontman — isolated man gets thrown into stardom, isolated man uncomfortable with stardom, isolated man caves in every way possible, the end. Journalist Michael Azerrad’s interviews with Cobain suggest more to the story, with the juicy bits of 25 collective hours of previously unreleased interviews. The clips make Cobain a posthumous narrator to his own tragedy.
Those expecting a Nirvana documentary will be disappointed. There is no Nirvana music, no interviews with talking heads. When the 2006 Toronto Film Festival audience watched the premiere, they instead heard solely the interview footage, mixed with imagery from cities where the rock legend came to be. Observe the endlessly cloudy landscape and you get the idea.
Though premiering in 2006, the DVD hit shelves just last month and includes scene commentary, a location scouting documentary and a “behind the voices” doc.
