I was ready to dive into Into America’s Wild, IMAX’s latest addition to their big-screen movies in Victoria, but what first sounded like a really cool wild-child experience soon became a story with no clear plot.
The movie follows Alaskan bush pilot Ariel Tweto, Native American astronaut John Herrington, and long-distance hiker Jennifer Pharr Davis as they explore everywhere from Alaska to outer space. After a quick introduction, the movie hurries from Alaska to space and you wonder how this just happened.
While the pictures are stunning at times, it feels quite off to combine two topics that are so different into one story without a clear line of narration. While Tweto is very energetic and spreads a positive vibe throughout the movie it still feels like watching sequences of short films just lined up one after another.
It makes sense that Into America’s Wild feels like a long advertisement for various US vacations: an airline, an online travel portal, and a marketing group for American travel are the three organizations presenting this “movie.”
I kind of struggle to describe a main vibe of Into America’s Wild, since it, unfortunately, doesn’t seem to have one. But, obviously, some of the shots are quite stunning and the big IMAX screen pays off here.
I particularly liked one little detail about the golden-hued grove of aspens forest in Utah and that they say that science has shown all the aspen trees actually have the same DNA, which means it is one breathing organism and not just single trees in a forest. The shots of them in the fall look absolutely stunning in the movie.
Then the movie inexplicably goes from shots of nature to discussing programs for hearing-impaired children, helping them to connect with nature. While this is also quite neat, I’m missing the emotional connection between all the topics they try to cover in just 45 minutes of an IMAX movie.
The movie wants a lot but gives little—it feels rushed and there isn’t enough time to focus on a single topic because they’re taking on a whole variety of topics, from biology to space to nature to technology.
If you’re currently planning a trip to the US this tourism advertisement/movie is for you. If you’re searching for some entertainment on a rainy day, I recommend one of the many good movies also currently playing now at IMAX.