Where the Wild Things Are” is a classic story about childhood and the places we go to figure out the world we live in.
Max, a rambunctious and sensitive boy feels misunderstood at home and escapes to where the Wild Things are. Max lands on an island where he meets mysterious and strange creatures whose emotions are as wild and unpredictable as their actions.
The Wild Things desperately long for a leader to guide them, just as Max longs for a kingdom to rule. When Max is crowned king, he promises to create a place where everyone will be happy. Max soon finds, though, that ruling his kingdom is not so easy and his relationships there prove to be more complicated than he originally thought.
Inside All Of Us Is A Wild Thing
“I didn’t set out to make a children’s movie; I set out to make a movie about childhood,” says director Spike Jonze, whose big-screen adaptation of the captivating Maurice Sendak classic Where the Wild Things Are was truly a labor of love. In it, he further explores the themes Sendak introduced and which Jonze believes remain relevant to every generation. “It’s about what it’s like to be eight or nine years old and trying to figure out the world, the people around you, and emotions that are sometimes unpredictable or confusing-which is really the challenge of negotiating relationships all your life,” he says. “It’s no different at that age.”
“Where the Wild Things Are” offers a fresh look-and for many of us, a look back-into the many facets of childhood. It invites audiences of all ages to join in the discovery and challenge and pure feral joy of a young boy’s brave journey to the island of the Wild Things, a special place that’s sure to stir thoughts of the wild things that live in all of us.
“In a way, it’s an action movie starring a nine-year-old. There’s a lot of physical mayhem like dirt clod fights and rampaging in the forest,” says Jonze. Indeed, the island offers up every youngster’s fantasy: the freedom to run and jump and howl, to build and destroy and wrestle and throw things as far as he can… most of all, to do only the things he wants to do, with no one saying he can’t.
Read the Full Production Notes
Where the Wild Things Are
Starring: Catherine Keener, Benicio Del Toro, Forest Whitaker, Lauren Ambrose, Catherine O’Hara, Michael Berry, James Gandolfini
Directed by: Spike Jonze
Screenplay by: Dave Eggers
Release Date: October 16, 2009
MPAA Rating: PG for mild thematic elements, some adventure action and brief language.
Studio: Warner Bros. Pictures
Box Office Totals
Domestic: $77,233,467 (77.2%)
Foreign: $22,853,326 (22.8%)
Total: $100,086,793 (Worldwide)