Into The Wild - Theatrical Trailer

I just re read the book this movie is based on. 

Read the book then see the movie. 

Then go to Youtube and look at all the related videos. There is one with an interview with his father. One with an interview done with his mother. Both done at the site of their son's death at the old school bus out in the wilderness of Alaska.

   Chris is a hero to many and considered a fool by many. He went into the wilderness unprepared and
unwilling to listen to older wiser heads who could have taught him.

Chris McCandless reminds me a great deal of Jim Morrison. Both grew up in the wilderness of the Washington, D.C. suburbs. Chris in Annandale, Va. and Jim Morrison in Alexandria, Va. Both had hard driving highly successful fathers. Morrison's father was a Navy Admiral. Chris's father was a NASA scientist.  Both had "Daddy Issues". And extended that to society issues.
Both Chris and Jim chose a path that led to self destruction.
They never had a chance to grow up.
I saw Morrison and the Doors at the Alexandria Rollerrink  back in 1967 or 1968 on The Doors first tour.
He was on the cusp of fame and it would destroy him.

 Annandale is a bedroom suburb where there is "no there there" as Gertrude Stein said of another place in America. Oakland, Ca. I believe it was.

  If I had grown up in Annandale, Va. I would have wanted to get out of there also. There is no town there. I can understand Chris's longing for solitude and a wilderness devoid of endless suburban homes that all look alike. A suburban desert with nothing but fast food joints and K Marts and middle middle middle class people. Sadly much of America is now like this. WalMart has killed off most all of the small towns in America. 

INTO THE WILD would be a good book for English teachers to teach to high school seniors and also college English profs to have their students read to discuss.
Was Chris a fool or a really brave young man or both?
Was he simply too smart and too headstrong for his own good?
How can young men grow up in a suburban wilderness and not want to get out and explore the world and try to find something that is "real" and not fake.