Eurokom 2010

Into the wild

The movie „Into the wild“ is about Christopher McCandless, who travelled two years from Washington to Mexico and Alaska. His motivation was:”to be free”. He started his adventure in 1990 and finished it in 1992.

1. Family and School

Christopher’s parents had a lot of problems in their partnership; the main problem was that his father was married with another woman and with this women he had another family with two kids. That’s why Christopher described himself as a bastard. His parents had a business called „Consulting Enterprise“ but with making their first million, the partnership problems raised. Christopher’s father had beaten his mother in front of him and his sister Carine. They nearly divorced but they changed their opinion because of the children. Christopher said that they were living their lies.

At the graduation from high school exam, where all the parents were present, they were celebrating the entry of the students into the society. But Christopher didn´t fit into it, he jumped on the platform, unlike the other students, he showed his freedom to all the parents and students who were watching him.
After the graduation, his father wanted to buy him a new car, but he refused, because he saw it as a payment from his father to enter into society.

His mother described the graduation with those words: „the absurd duty of graduating from college“. His words were: „I disengage from that world of abstraction, false security, and material excess“. Things that Christopher put out of his existence.

3. A way out of society

Know, after having finished school, he told his parents that he is going to study at Harvard University but his real aim was to leave his family, his sister Carine and his parents, and to become free. He donated 20000 dollars from his grant to a health foundation. Then he drove into the wild! But he ignored a warning sign which said that the area was flooded, so his car was flooded while he was sleeping in it. He survived, but he decided to continue on foot. He left the car and burned all his money. As a last sign of being free, he changed his name into Alexander Supertramp. In a boat shop he wanted to buy a canoe but he needed money for the canoe, so he worked on a farm. He brought in the harvest with machines; this was a big step towards his life in the nature.
After buying the canoe he wanted to travel down the canyon, just for fun. But he was not allowed to travel on the river, because he wasn´t qualified to ride a canoe on such a dangerous river and apart from that, the queue was so long that he had to wait until 2004 to be allowed to travel on it. The society blocked the entrance to the nature, but as we know Chris, he decided to travel on it, even if it is illegal.
On the river he met two Swedish people, who told him that he could travel down to Mexico on this river, and so he did.





2. New family and a new society

After being in Mexico Christopher walked towards Alaska.
On this journey he met Jane and Randy, they showed him a new society with more love and more understanding. They were living in a bus and they wanted to drive to an old military base where a lot of hippies come together. He found a new family in these two people. He drove with them to the military base where he fell in love with a girl who lived in another bus. Like Randy and Jane they loved each other, but she was only 16 years old that’s why Christopher didn´t want to start a relationship with her. Christopher only wanted to go into the to nature and live his life.

4. Now I walk into the wild

He trained his body for the large journey he was going to do and in spring Christopher went alone into the wild; he crossed a small river that separated the civilization from the nature. But he felt a strange feeling coming from the nature. Now he was alone, he had no phone, no pool, no pets, no cigarettes, the absolute freedom, was to be no longer poisoned by civilization.

After living a long time in an abandoned bus, he realized that he was not happy living all alone in the wild and he wanted to go back to his love and his new family.
But because of the melted water from the glaciers he could not cross the river that had become enormous, trying to cross the river he nearly died.
The time passed and the winter came, he tried to hunt for some food but he did not find any, so he searched for roots but he confused the potato root with the wild potato root, as a consequence he poisoned himself eating the wild potato roots which are toxic, so he died slowly and painfully.

Two weeks later two hunters found his body and a piece of wood with the words: Happiness is only real when shared.