Krakauer's elegantly constructed narrative takes us from the ghoulish moment Krakauer picks through the adventures and sorrows of Chris McCandless's brief life, the story becomes painfully moving. Journals, and in between silences would jabber out his ''philosophy'' for hours, but the Supertramp's ideas are never lucid enough to give us a clue.Īnd yet, as Mr. What was with this guy? Why should we care if he had no better sense than this? (The reactions of most Alaskans who read about his death ranged from annoyance to indignation.) And what ''false being''? He kept August?''ĭying at the age of 24, he had resumed his real name. I am out collecting berries close by and shall return In the name of God, please remain to save me. I am injured, near death and too weak to hike out of here. The hunters who found his rotting corpse in September also found this note: He tried to smokeīy late summer, McCandless's incompetence and overconfidence had caught up with him. Somehow McCandless grubbed a living from the snows - gathering last year's rose hips and wizened berries, shooting squirrels, ptarmigans, porcupines and finally, in June, with his puny little. He then entered on what he called, in a manifesto scrawled on a piece of plywood, ''the climactic battle to kill the false being within.'' Krakauer writes, and took up residence in a rusting Fairbanks city bus that had been fitted out asĪ crude shelter. It was April, still winter in Alaska.Ĭoming upon the impassable Toklat River, he gave up the idea of walking the 300 miles from Mount McKinley to the Bering Sea, Mr.
22-caliber rifle and walked into theįorest, to live off the land or die trying. Alex shouldered his backpack - containing little more than books and rice - and his. Named him Christopher McCandless, but in his travels he preferred the invented identity Alexander Supertramp. The starting point of a narrative that seeks to find out why we should care.Īn electrician who had picked him up four miles out of Fairbanks pressed a pair of rubber boots and two sandwiches on the dangerously underequipped but charming hitchhiker, who would vouchsafe no name but Alex. I'm very grateful for it.The strangely fascinating hero of Jon Krakauer's strangely fascinating book ''Into the Wild'' is a young man who starved to death in the Alaskan wilderness in the summer of 1992. that's all I've ever wanted to be, playing different roles, and is a different role for me, and one I've hungered for for a long time. He has performed that role more than 2,000 times, dating back more than 40 years.ĭespite his love for Twain and his witticisms, Holbrook says it wouldn't even occur to him to quote the humorist if he were to win the Academy Award. Modeling himself on one particular character - humorist and author Mark Twain - has been a significant part of Holbrook's career. But I've always had a hunger to find the role where I didn't have to characterize anybody, where I could just be myself. "I have modeled myself on characters all my life, and I've enjoyed it. But Holbrook says he did not meet Franz - an older man who befriended McCandless during his wilderness wanderings - and he doesn't regret it. Holbrook's character in Into the Wild, Ron Franz, is based on a real person. My wife's not too happy about it, but I can't help myself," Holbrook says. My lord, I want to do it myself.' I see a hill or a cliff, and I want to climb it. "They asked me if I wanted to have a stand-in. So I've done a few things like that."Įven now, Holbrook doesn't shy away from physical challenges: In one scene from Into the Wild, his character climbs up a steep, rocky hill. "I was up there four days alone, passed out on a glacier. "I tried to climb a mountain myself all alone once without ever knowing what I was doing," Holbrook says. Holbrook says he felt an emotional connection to the 22-year-old Christopher McCandless, played in the film by actor Emile Hirsch. He read about it years before director Sean Penn ever sent him a script. Holbrook knew the tragic story of the young wilderness wanderer in Into the Wild. He has won a best supporting actor nomination for his role in the film, Into the Wild.īut the actor is probably better known for two other roles: for the glow of his cigarette and the whites of his eyes, as the quintessential anonymous source, Deep Throat, in All the President's Men, and for his portrayal of humorist Mark Twain. Hollywood veteran Hal Holbrook received his first Oscar nod this year - at age 83.
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