Starring: Reese Witherspoon, Laura Dern, Thomas Sadoski,
Wild
Director: Jean-Marc Vallée
Rating: 4/5
Reese Witherspoon is an actress who has been picking up Best Actress awards left, right, and centre in recent weeks, for her central performance as Cheryl Strayed in Wild.
Wild is based on the memoir Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail by Strayed, and sees Witherspoon team up with director Jean-Marc Vallee for the first time. This is also the first film for the director since the success of Dallas Buyers Club at the beginning of last year.
With the dissolution of her marriage and the death of her mother, Cheryl Strayed has lost all hope. After years of reckless, destructive behaviour, she makes a rash decision. With absolutely no experience, driven only by sheer determination, Cheryl hikes more than a thousand miles of the Pacific Crest Trail, alone.
Wild powerfully captures the terrors and pleasures of one young woman forging ahead against all odds on a journey that maddens, strengthens, and ultimately heals her.
First and foremost, it is great to see Witherspoon back in a major dramatic role as she really gives a stunning, powerful and heartbreaking performance as Strayed - we really haven't seen her get many chances to show what she is made of as an actress in recent years.
For Witherspoon's performance alone Wild is well worth the price of a cinema ticket as, I thought, she give a truly mesmerising performance. Witherspoon really got under the skin of this character and you really felt the pain she was in after the team of her mother. Wild really is a movie that explores the impact of grief and how it manifests in different ways in different people. For Strayed, it was destruction that saw her get into drugs and lose her marriage along the way.
Witherspoon captures the vulnerability of this character at the beginning of the film, but her fighting spirit and resilience shines thought as we see this character go on a major journey from the start to the end of the film - she starts to accept what has happened in her life and move forward to become the woman her mother would have wanted her to be.
While there is also a terrific supporting performance from Laura Dern, this is a movie that is all about Witherspoon. She carries Wild from start to finish with such power and grace - you really can't take your eyes off her.
I suppose that watching someone on a long walk doesn't sound all that exciting, but the director has crafted a beautiful personal movie that is supporting by a stunning backdrop of spectacular landscapes.
Wild is Witherspoon at her stripped back best and I would love to see her take on more roles that this going forward. It is definitely her finest performance since Walk The Line, while Jean-Marc Vallée continues to establish himself as a very exciting filmmaker.