Where the Wild Things Are (2009)

“Where the Wild Things Are” is a rare, beautiful film. It well may be the best film of the year, and certain to bring on some hate. Similar to the Maurice Sendak book, this “Wild” film is about children, not necessarily for children. Nor is it for whimsical adults who lie to themselves and others that all of childhood is sweet, innocent and fun.

The very best scene in the excellent film comes early in the 100-minute running time. Young Max (Max Records) is building a snow fort and longing for his older sister to play with him. But she’s a teen now, and at nine, Max doesn’t get that she has moved on from childish goofing. When her teen friends visit, Max starts a snowball fight with the older boys. You can see the pure joy in Max’s eyes – the big kids are playing with him! -- even as he's pelted. Then one teen jumps onto the fort's roof, smashing it flat with the boy inside. Max rises, covered in snow, sobbing angry, devastated hot tears. Raging mad, and unable to do anything.

The scene devastates. I can remember being that upset child, and I can well recall that look on my younger brother’s face when I similarly did him wrong. I cannot recall a more realistic scene in a Hollywood film about children. Nor a more realistic boy. Max is impulsive, stubborn, bursting with insane energy and sudden snaps of lethargy, he demands attention from his busy mother (Catherine Keener) and can’t comprehend why she can’t give it, his moods swings from happy to sad in an instant. He hates frozen corn, saying it’s not “real corn” in perfect nonsensical child logic. This “Wild Thing” is absolutely true.

Nonsense? Find me one real moment in crap such as “Yours, Ours and Mine” or “Stepmom.” Those films tackle childhood struggles with saccharin and the false notion that if we just pretend everything is happy, then it is. Bull. Spike Jonze, director of “Being John Malkovich,” calls that bluff in a feat of miraculous bravery. He has created yet another masterwork that strikes the heart the further it twists the mind. It certainly follows no pattern of any other childhood-themed film I’ve ever seen. Neither did “E.T.”

If you’ve read the book, you know the story: Young Max acts many a mischief, and attracts the rage of his mother, who sends him to bed. Sans supper. There, he dreams himself as king of an island of wild, rampaging monsters … until he longs for his dinner, and his mother. When he wakes, dinner is waiting and still hot. (What a beautiful story about love, anger and forgiveness, by both mother and child.)

Jonze’s screenplay, co-written by Dave Eggers, uses the book as a launching pad. Each island monster has been fleshed out, with the leader (voiced by the magnificent James Gandolfini) standing in for Max’s temperamental, work-in-progress self. The other monsters fill out various personality traits – the big sister who’s found new friends and wants to leave home, the monster who feels ignored and alone, representing another part of Max. The boy in wolf’s clothing then takes on what he previously could not do: Build an indestructible fort. Alas, his monsters, similar to many a child, won’t follow rules. They wreck havoc with petty jealousies, misunderstandings and fragile feelings, and as children play with each other, rules and alliances change on a dime, sometimes with no logic involved. As in the book, Max needs to grow up to cope.

The island and the creatures bring to mind the late Jim Henson’s kiddie classic (and quite scary at age 10) “The Dark Crystal.” (It’s no mistake that Jim Henson’s creature shop built the monsters.) The creatures are absolutely believable (only their facial movements are CGI), and look “real” – as far as a boy’s imagination goes. The sets are wildly intricate affairs, crazily shaped and almost Seussian in nature, as if built by a child's imagination. This section of the film apparently stumped Jonze for two years as he squabbled with studio brass. None of those struggles show up on screen, though. The entire production, cinematography and music (by Karen of the Yeah, Yeah, Yeahs and Carter Burwell) is a child-centric delight.

Max Records as the title character is brilliant. There doesn’t seem to be a false note in his performance, which is free of all the cute banter that gets dumped on most children in Hollywood films. (I really like “Home Alone,” but it's bunk.) When Max rages, I can see myself at various ages, smashing a truck built out of Legos against a wall because my older brother demands its parts, and taking hammers to Matchbox cars to make crash ups more “realistic.” And I sure as hell raged at my mother. Every kid has. Even when he’s comfortable snuggled in a ball at the bottom of a monster pile in pure child joy, Max seems real and in the moment. (I dearly love the book, falling in step is easy.) In a small, quick role, Keener is equally fantastic.

The final scene is just as heartfelt as the book’s. On the page, mom is never seen. Here, Max comes home from hiding place to find his mother frantic worried. (We don’t learn how long he’s been gone, an hour? Two?) As he eats that hot soup so important in the book, mom -- exhausted -- falls asleep at the dining room table. And Max watches her, silently. Like the book, it’s a beautiful scene about love and forgiveness, and trying to grow up. And Jonze and Eggers (who knows rough childhoods) know that none of this easy. Or perfect. Or pain free. But it can be magical. This is Hollywood at its best. A