Where the Wild Things Are

On paper it was 2009’s most intriguing and promising project. Spike Jonze ushers Maurice Sendak’s pre-reading classic onto the big screen with a hipper-than-thou cast and Karen O on the OST. There were rumours, of course. Unconfirmed reports of unhappy studio backers, of new edits, of children crying at test screenings. We know precisely how they feel. Where the Wild Things Are is an admirably wayward picture, but it’s a hard film to love. The low key opening featuring Max Records as a high-spirited, hyperactive little vandal who storms off on mom Catherine Keener after family bust-up. He sails away to the fantastic island of the title and wears himself out with monsters voiced by folks like James Gandolfini and Natalie Portman. Max soon learns that kid-centric anarchy is not without its drawbacks, an instruction delivered with few concessions to form by its director. The entire island section is a perverse, deliberate mess, the cinematic equivalent of squiggles on a page. Only a singular talent like Mr. Jonze could cook up a kid’s movie with a message about what tiresome, rotten little brats they can be.