‘Into the Wild’ one of the year’s best films

In theaters

INTO THE WILD, written and directed by Sean Penn, based on Jon Krakauer’s book, 140 minutes, rated R.

So far, two of the year’s best films have been directed by two actors, each of whom has won Academy Awards – one for writing, the other for acting.

The first film of note, “Gone Baby Gone,” was directed and co-written by Ben Affleck, whose career was in serious decay until he decided to get serious and show us again why he should matter.

He did so – powerfully.

The second film, “Into the Wild,” is from Sean Penn, who wrote and directed the movie from Jon Krakauer’s best-selling nonfiction book. It is a first-rate account of a story that, depending on your perspective, did or didn’t end so well for Christopher Johnson McCandless (a terrific Emile Hirsch).

Some will recall that McCandless was the young man from a wealthy Virginia family who in 1990 chose not enter Harvard Law School or the work force upon graduating from Emory University. Instead, he gave away his life savings to charity, set fire to the rest of his cash and his personal identification, and disappeared without a word to anyone into a more challenging world – the wild.

Penn’s film follows McCandless’ two-year journey into himself via the outside world, which was driven by the need to escape his controlling, bickering parents (Marcia Gay Harden, William Hurt) even though in doing so, it also meant leaving behind his beloved younger sister, Carine (Jenna Malone).

It’s she who narrates the story, filling in key background information about her brother while Penn weaves back and forward through time in an effort to understand why he did what he did. Though his movie isn’t about judging McCandless – it’s more interested in observing the man, thus allowing us to decide for ourselves whether his choices were romantic, cruel, necessary or reckless – there’s no denying that Penn admires his subject’s moxie, which obviously was inspired by the likes of Thoreau, Kerouac, Whitman and London.

What makes “Into the Wild” as emotionally rich as it is are the people McCandless meets along the way, all of whom offer kindness, insight, clarity, debate.

Catherine Keener and Brian Dierker are memorable as two aging hippies who see in Chris traces of their younger selves; in them, Chris sees the parents he would have preferred. In a small role, Vince Vaughn reminds us that he can act, in this case as a South Dakota farmer on the outs with the law. Kristen Stewart trembles believably with the thrum of first love when she meets Chris, who has little time for the love she offers.

As good as all of these actors are – and they are very, very good here – it’s Hal Holbrook in an Academy Award-worthy role as the elderly, God-fearing Ron Franz who shakes the movie alive with its mournful undercurrent. Franz is the last person Chris meets before giving himself over to the Alaskan wild and to the truth about life it presumably holds. There’s irony in that truth – happiness is best shared, which Ron figured out awhile ago – but there’s no telling Chris that, so onward he pushes, into the wild, meeting adventure along the way and, too late (or just in time – you decide), himself.

Grade: A

On HD DVD

OLD SCHOOL, directed by Todd Phillips, written by Phillips and Scot Armstrong, 91 minutes, rated R.

“Old School” comes from the folks who gave us “Road Trip,” and, in turn, Tom Green in his first film role – the one in which he tickled a live mouse with his tongue before popping it in his mouth as if it were some sort of Dickensian hors d’oeuvre.

For most, that will be the end of this review as they’ll immediately know whether “Old School” is for them. So, see you on Friday.

However, for those who are still on the fence about whether to see it, “Old School” is, in fact, old hat, the sort of film that’s never as nostalgic as its title suggests – unless, of course, the nostalgia we’re talking about harkens back to the days before the troglodytes.

Luke Wilson, Vince Vaughn and Will Ferrell star as a group of 30-something men trying to recapture their prime by starting the sort of fraternity that stages KY Jelly wrestling matches between 80-year-old men and young, nubile co-eds – the type who enjoy performing in the nude.

Only two jokes got a rise out of the audience at my original screening in 2003 – the one in which Ferrell takes a tranquilizer dart to the throat, which is funny, and the one in which several young men gather on a rooftop, tie cement blocks to their unmentionables and hope for the best as those blocks are hurled into the air in an alarming show of faith.

Not surprisingly, castration is a theme that runs throughout “Old School,” particularly since all of these men – Wilson’s Mitch, Vaughn’s Beanie and Ferrell’s Frank – are feeling neutered in their relationships. It’s the hard living they feel they must do to overcome their irrational fears about spending the rest of their lives “with one vagina,” as the film delicately puts it, that allegedly gives “Old School” its frat-boy kick.

And yet the movie is a dim bulb with no energy to light it. It’s lazy and colorless, a dull, shapeless film that proves the American dream is alive and well in Hollywood. In that town – at least when there isn’t a writers’ strike – apparently anyone can succeed, even those with a bad script and no clue that the best comedies rely on timing, attention to character, and wit.

Grade: D-

Visit www.weekinrewind.com, the archive of Bangor Daily News film critic Christopher Smith’s reviews, which appear Mondays, Fridays and weekends in Lifestyle, as well as on bangordailynews.com. He may be reached at Christopher@weekinrewind.com.