We’ve been dying to read it and we finally got a copy of the “Where The Wild Things Are” script written by Spike Jonze and Dave Eggers a few weeks ago. As we all probably know the original children’s classic written and illustrated by Maurice Sendak is only 33 pages long and includes about 15 sentences in the entire book, (there’s 338 words total!) so to say Jonze and Eggers had to heavily extrapolate from the original work is a bit of an understatement.
The Book
The original story, to refresh your memory, is bare bones. Max is sent to his room without supper for behaving badly, he then escapes into his imagination on a sailboat to a land where the Wild Things are. They play rambunctiously, they cavort, he becomes their leader and then abruptly – and seemingly for no other reason than hunger – he decides to leave the island and sail back home. The ‘Wild Things’ beg him to stay, but he refuses and returns home to finds the soup his mother has cooked for him is still warm. That’s it.
The Screenplay By Jonze & Dave Eggers
The script utilizes almost all of those elements, but infuses them with an incredibly poignant and human explanation. The script’s key strength is how Jonze and Eggers dig deep into the emotional psychology of the characters, Max and the Monsters. Obviously there’s a ton of invention on their part, but it all feels extremely honest and very much in the spirit of the Sendak book. It’s also apologetically bittersweet, sometimes bizarre yet beautiful and very-much an adult story. The sense of boyish wonder and awe captured in the writing is just incredibly touching and truthful.
The Emotional Psychology
The way they explain, describe and set-up the motivations behind Max’s misbehavior is masterfully composed, heartfelt and very genuine. The excitable and anxious boy comes from a broken home and his mother (to be played by Catherine Keener) is a single mom with a new boyfriend that Max detests. As an eight-year-old boy, he’s far too young to really understand everything, but his parent’s divorce has clearly left him angry, bitter, confused and hurt. He’s in a ton of pain and lashes out in all kinds of ways. To make things worst, one of his best friends, his older sister Claire, has finally reached that early pre-teen age where she wants nothing to do with her dumb little brother. Just months ago they were tight and now, they’re completely estranged and Max is too little too understand why she’s acting distant all of a sudden. It’s all too painful for him.
His exhausted and overworked Mom attempts to send him to his room without supper when he lashes out in a tantrum that keeps escalating and going out of control, but Max, full of pain and frustration escapes through the frontdoor and runs away to the nearby woods by his house. From there he mysteriously comes across a lake in the middle of the forest with an old sail boat in it and his adventure begins.
There’s approximately 20-25 minutes of this set-up in the film before Max meets the monsters (typically a screenplay is loosely one minute of screen time for page; Max meets the Wild Things on page 22) he finds these over-sized, smelly creatures are like a dysfunctional family each with their own structure, history and complicated dynamics. And more importantly they have the psyche of children: they pout, they get intensely angry and frustrated when things don’t go right, they feel massive child-like disappointment and like children are wont to do, they constantly hurt each others feelings in the things they do and say. They’re also huge, they don’t know their own strength and when they lash out they have the capability of doing serious damage with their menacing sharp claws and fangs.
Max has to win them over to become their king and it’s not easy initially. But eventually, he’s crowned the boss and their adventures include coming across giant hawks and dogs, whirling tornadoes named Larry Wermer and a hairy little “Thing” that crawls out of Max’s mouth.
The Potential Problems
Now the story is effective, and the emotional underpinnings are deeply conveyed, however there are problems and we can understand the reservations Warner Bros. might have, though we might have entirely separate issues. Eggers can write a mean story and we can’t wait to read the long-form book version he’s planning on writing, however, you can tell this is his first screenplay. For one it’s extremely unconventional – screenplays traditionally don’t have so much internal character information, it’s all about the maxim, “show don’t tell,” but this is exactly what “Wild Things’ does. It’s too be expected from a novelist, but could provide problems on the other end of the camera if those emotions can’t quite be expressed visually.
The Unconventional Screenplay
The script also lacks any real dramatic arc and doesn’t really have the “increasing difficulties” tenet that most screenplays and movies adhere to. There’s a lack of structure and there’s no major stakes. Yes, not every screenplay and movie needs to contain the three-act structure that is inherent in most scripts, lord know a lot of films – and certainly many indie ones that meander well – that have successfully defied and transcended the regular conventions and archetypes of screenwriting, but with an $80-plus million film one can understand why one might be slightly nervous that those “traditional beats” are missing. And presumably, Jon Vitti’s re-write add some of those elements, though it seems like his tweaks were dialogue re-writes which is slightly worrisome, because they might change the tone of some of the more disconcerting elements (more on that in a sec).
“Old Joy” (for a random indie example) had very little story, it was a wandering and no real dramatic arcs, but hell, it worked perfectly for that film (it’s amazing, see it), but it also cost like $10 bucks to make (likely less than $1 million); not a lot of risk there.
Studio Concerns?
The other “problem” (or perhaps studio concern) is the disquieting troublesome tones. In the script, Max is incredibly nervous and anxious and it gets to be a bit much. Their is no reprise from the worry in the script and at almost every moment, there’s an element of fear present. Max walks around on tip-toes trying not to upset the Wild Things knowing that they might eat him at any second. There’s not a lot of “fun,” happy scenes, nor is there many funny moments. That’s relative of course, there are joyful, tender and cute moments, but the overriding sentiment is one of anxiety and we wouldn’t be surprised if WB wanted to punch up the fun moments (we’re not endorsing that,
Too Emotional For Kids?
One of the main concerns people tout is that the film is apparently too scary for children and everyone says, kids can handle it, and surely they can, but ‘Wild Things’ is scary and rather somewhat disturbing and we could totally see kids crying and or feeling anxious and worried, but a) that’s the whole point and b) who says a child crying has to be a bad thing or have a bad connotation? (that’s too simple-minded and reductive) Plus if kids do cry in this thing it won’t be out of fear, it’ll be in a bittersweet happy/sad melancholy when Max leaves the Wild Things in the end and goes home (it’s genuinely tearful moment fraught with sadness). ‘Wild Things’ is dark, there’s no doubt about it and it could be traumatizing in some ways, but those are only negative connotations for those looking at the short term reaction and not realizing longtail resonance and deep impact the film could have emotionally with kids.
Forest Whitaker’s ‘Wild Things’ “Review”
And some people essentially agree with this assessment, namely ‘Wild Things’ voice-actor Forest Whitaker. One of the best “reviews” of the film (and therefore screenplay) is what he told MTV News back in March. “[The dark scenes] are the point of the movie, and I hope that they maintain that point, because I think children can identify with a character who is upset…it gets intense…because we’re representing the things inside of the kid. They represent his struggles, either him being too angry or being confused, or not feeling like he belongs. They’re a gargantuan extension of the way he’s feeling inside.” Whitaker’s take: the film is emotionally dark, but kids can ultimately handle it.
If done properly, children could be somewhat scared and concerned, and tearful, but in the same way an early Disney movie like Bambi was when his mother was shot. It was traumatizing for sure, but not in bad scarring way and, it left and indelible mark and Wild Things could easily attain that classic feeling in the end if not fucked with too much.
At the end of the day though, it’s all in the execution. What’s in the script may feel one way, but when actors and cameras get to those moments they can always change. And scripts always change (and clearly, with re-writes already in the works, this story has been augmented; how much? That no one seems to know yet). Even if no tweaks were made and the script was shot word for word, it could still work, like many semi, anti-dramatic indie films have in the past. Scripts are a menu and inevitably come out different in translation, they have to, there’s too many factors and happy accidents involved in filmmaking for them not to, but we can kind of understand studio concern considering they’re all about bottom dollar.
Ultimately, “Where The Wild Things Are” is a beautiful read and we can’t wait to read Dave Eggers’ solo novel form of the script tentatively called, “The Wild Things,” that inspired by Sendak’s original book and presumably uses many of the imagined and created elements in the screenplay. It’s likely finished by now, but probably won’t come out until the film is finally released. And when’s that? Right now it’s anyone’s guess. Until then, we eagerly await this film (anyone want to send us the Jon Vitti re-write? :).