After graduating in 1990 from Emory University, Chris McCandless decides to move on from his traditional life, give away all his money, and go on to live a life without materialism and uniformity. Jon Krakauer's Into the Wild is a non-fictional text that shows a boy's struggle out of conformity and on the road to a more free and simple life. In both the text and the movie, Sean Penn and Jon Krakauer both play with the time line and jump back and forth in his new and old life to show his adventure to and in Alaska. This technique is an effective way to combine his old and new life and by comparing scenes we are able to better understand why Chris McCandless embarks upon his journey, but, this back and forth approach is more effective in the movie than the text. In the movie, Penn utilizes an out of order time line, vivid symbolism, and an exaggerated use of love of his sister and family to convey McCandless true story; whereas the text reads more as a systematic newspaper article with less emotional effect.

Both the text and the movie start the story off with McCandless already on his journey, a technique that allows the reader or viewer to jump into the story right away. Starting the story off by showing McCandless in these harsh Alaska conditions makes the viewer wonder what kind of life he must have had to lead him to this point, a question that is partially answered by the following scene. The scene that comes next is a flashback to McCandless' graduation from Emory and his graduation lunch with his family. In the film, during the graduation ceremony in which he appears to be a normal happy boy, McCandless does a voice over discussing his parents. He starts off with their love life and how they met when they were young, and eventually gets to his fathers past of his previous marriage and how that effected him. At the restaurant following the ceremony, McCandless' parents are made out to be uptight and frigid. The majority of their conversation is awkward and the only thing they talk about is the possibility of their son attending Harvard Law School. The negativity with which he talks about his parents in the voice over and the way they are made out to be at lunch shows his disconnect from his family and offers some explanation for why he runs away. The book is less effective in showing this because it focuses on more of the positives and shows his parents in a better light. For example, McCandless gives his mother candy, flowers, and a sentimental card for Mother's day, a random act that shows his love and affection, which is something he does not show toward his mother in the film. The text also entirely leaves out the lunch scene which takes away an example that shows McCandless' detached feelings from his family, which is an important element to why he decides to disappear. 

Another way in which the film is more effective than the text is through the use of imagery and symbolism. The book focuses on some of McCandless relationships and the process of him traveling from place to place, but the movie is able to show the pure happiness he feels through his travels even when he is not talking or writing in his journal. There are moments such as when he is driving his old Datsun car on the long open road with cheerful music playing in the background. This scene happens soon after the scene of having lunch with his parents and before his Datsun is destroyed by the flash flood. The camera shows a far away angle of his small car alone on a long empty road, symbolizing the start of his long journey and how small he truly is compared to nature. After he abandons his Datsun and begins to hitchhike, there is a scene that shows him walking through a beautiful forest filled with bright greens and blues and animal life and sounds of birds. In this moment he seems truly happy and at peace, which is something that is not described in the text. In the following scenes, McCandless is picked up by Jan and her husband Rainey, a couple he becomes especially close with. In the book, Jan describes to the reader what happened when they picked him up, "Alex took a ride from us up to Orick Beach, where we were staying, and camped with us for a week. He was a really good kid" (Krakauer 30). This was the extent that the beach trip was talked about and the most affection that Jan used when talking about her friend Alex. However, in the movie the beach scene extends much longer and shows a much deeper depth to their relationship. On the beach, McCandless jumps up onto a rock with a lot of spirit and energy to talk to Rainey. They talk for a while about life, love, truth, and even McCandless' fear of water. After that, McCandless decides to get over his fear by playfully running after Jan on the beach and jumping in the ocean with her. Eventually when he leaves in the middle of the night to continue his journey, Jan and Rainey are heartbroken. Moments like this of laughing and playing on a big open beach are an effective way of showing how light hearted McCandless was and how much of an effect he had on people, which is not conveyed as well in the text. 

The film is also more effective in showing his struggles and battle to survive once he is alone in Alaska. When he shoots and kills the moose in the book, it explains it in systematic steps in a very calm way which doesn't fully show his anger and frustration when he is not able to preserve the moose. After a series of journal entries explaining his step by step process, Krakauer says, "At that point he gave up on preserving the bulk of the meat and abandoned the carcass to the wolves" (Krakauer 167). The way the text describes it takes about a half of a page and is very untheatrical, whereas in the movie it is much more dramatic. When he shoots the moose, he has a hard time butchering it and dealing with each of the pieces. Eventually, when he discovers he did not preserve it correctly and wasted most of the carcass, he is filled with rage and frustration and screams. The scene is very vivid showing the blood on his hands and the disappointment on his face when he has to watch the wolves eat the carcass because of his mistake. The way the movie portrays this failure is much more powerful and better shows the difficult battle he is fighting to survive. 

Another element that is exaggerated in the film that makes McCandless' story more emotional is his relationship with his parents and his sister, Carine McCandless. In the book, it is mentioned in the beginning that he has a complicated relationship with his parents, but is extremely close with his sister Carine. After this is mentioned, Carine is hardly mentioned and when the family is mentioned, it is in short segments. In the text, Krakauer never describes the family as heartbroken or shows any indication that they are in unbearable pain from the loss of their son. In chapter eleven when Krakauer interviews Walt McCandless, he says, "'How is it,' he wonders aloud as he gazes blankly across Chesapeake Bay, 'that a kid with so much compassion could cause his parents so much pain?'" (Krakauer 104). Although McCandless' dad says he is in pain, Krakauer describes him as talking with a "blank gaze", which seems to lack emotion. Throughout the encounter with his parents, they don't seem like they care half as much as they are made out to in the movie. In the movie, there is constant voice-overs of Carine talking about how she misses him but she understands what he is doing. This narration of his sister symbolizes the love that she and many people have for him how and no matter how hard he tries to disappear and stay unconnected, he will never truly be able to escape love and human relationships. There is also multiple cut-aways that show how the parents are reacting to everything. McCandless' mother becomes extremely depressed and begins to think every boy on the side of the street is her son, and there is even a scene of his father walking down the street and falling on his knees in anguish and heart break. There are also scenes showing the faults in his family such as his father beating his mother while McCandless and his sister are watching. The book explains that he feels detached and betrayed by his father because of his previous family and feeling like a bastard child, but this abusive scene in the movie offers more explanation about why he feels such negativity toward his parents. Showing these more personal moments of the family at home that are not described in the text contribute to the tragedy of his death by showing how much he was loved, and also give some more explanation as to why he wanted to escape by showing the struggles within his family.

Overall the film is much more effective in conveying Chris McCandless' story. Through the use of visuals Penn is able to dramatize the story and create a more emotional appeal. In the book when Krakauer jumps back and forth in the time line of McCandless life, it is more difficult to follow and the interviews he conducts with those McCandless interacted with makes it seem more like a journal article than a story. However, when Penn jumps back and forth in the time line, it becomes easier to compare his old and new life and is less difficult to follow. The visuals of nature shown in the movie also contribute to the audacity of the movie because the viewer is able to see the vast open mountain ranges as well as the fast food restaurants he works in, which ultimately allows them to go on the journey with him. Penn also shows more detail in the social interactions McCandless has with his new friends such a Jan, Westerberg, and Franz. These long scenes showing his developing friendships with others is more compelling and creates more of an emotional appeal than in the book when these friends simply describe to Krakauer what they remember about him. Going into more detail in the film about his relationships with his sister and parents as well as his new friends is also critical and adds to the pathos effect because knowing more about his family and what he had gone through in the past allows the viewer to have more sympathy for McCandless. In conclusion, the film more adequately shows the dramatic reality of living in the wild, and ultimately creates a better and more interesting story. 

