Wild
All actors and roles (10)
Short description
Wild is a drama about Cheryl Strayed, a woman whose life has come apart after her mother's death, the end of her marriage and a period of destructive behaviour. With no hiking experience, she sets out alone to walk the Pacific Crest Trail, a long route through the mountains and desert of the western United States, carrying a pack she has overloaded. The journey is physically punishing, and much of the film follows her struggle with heat, thirst, cold, hunger and the isolation of the trail, as well as her encounters with other travellers and with wildlife, while memories of the losses that brought her there return.
The film was directed by Jean-Marc Vallée, its sixth feature following Loser Love, C.R.A.Z.Y., The Young Victoria, Café de Flore and Dallas Buyers Club. Nick Hornby wrote the screenplay, and Reese Witherspoon produced through Pacific Standard with Bill Pohlad and Bruna Papandrea. Witherspoon plays Cheryl, with Laura Dern as her mother Bobbi, Keene McRae as her brother Leif, Gaby Hoffmann as Aimee, Michiel Huisman as Jonathan and Kevin Rankin as Greg, among 59 credited cast members and 75 credited crew.
Released in December 2014, Wild cost about 15 million dollars and took roughly 53 million worldwide. It holds a 7.1 rating on IMDb from around 146,000 votes and a 7 on TMDB from a few thousand, while a critics' rating of 7.4 from 275 reviews places it slightly above the audience scores.
What's left behind the scenes
- Young Cheryl was played by Cheryl Strayed's real-life daughter.
- The real Cheryl Strayed played an episodic role of a woman who gives the main character a ride at the beginning of the film and wishes her luck.
- The director specifically covered all the mirrors on the set so that Reese Witherspoon could not look at herself during filming.
- The director did not allow Reese Witherspoon to read the instructions for the tent and stove, so that her attempts to use them would look more realistic.
- Jennifer Lawrence, Scarlett Johansson, and Emma Watson were considered for the role of Cheryl, but in the end, the role went to Reese Witherspoon.
- Cheryl Strayed personally sent a copy of her book to Reese Witherspoon five months before its publication. Cheryl believed that Witherspoon was the only actress who could play her. The actress saw potential in the story and became interested in it, as it could be a great starting point for her production company.
- The backpack that Cheryl carries in the film was deliberately heavy to make the hiking scenes look more realistic.
- Judging by the newspaper headlines and the death of Jerry Garcia, the film takes place in 1995. However, Cheryl is reading the novel "Gone Girl," which was published only in 2012.
- When Cheryl undresses before the shower, abrasions from her backpack are visible on the front of her shoulders. However, when she looks in the mirror after the shower, these abrasions are gone.
- When a man on the street hands Cheryl a promotional flyer for a show dedicated to the memory of Jerry Garcia, the soda bottle she was holding suddenly disappears.
- When Cheryl is walking in the pouring rain, she meets a little boy. After talking to him and his grandmother, she continues on her way and soon falls to her knees and begins to cry. At that moment, as the camera zooms in on her face, it can be noticed that her hair instantly becomes dry.
- When Cheryl is dropped off at the trail, at the beginning of her hike, a watch and bracelet are visible on her left wrist. In subsequent shots in the same scene, the bracelet and watch appear on her right arm, then back on her left.
- At the beginning of the hike, when Cheryl howls with the wolves, a rounded mountain peak can be seen in the distance. This is a mountain known as “Monkey Face,” located in Smith Rock State Park in Oregon. However, at that moment in the film, Cheryl is in California.
- In one scene, Cheryl purifies water using a special filter. The water in the bottle is very cloudy and dirty, and Cheryl adds iodine to make it drinkable. The filter shown in the film actually makes the water clean and drinkable immediately, even if it was taken from a very murky source. Additional disinfection of the water after it has passed through this filter is not necessary.
- In one scene, the calendar shows “Friday, December 7th.” However, the events of the film take place in 1995, and December 7th was a Thursday that year.
- Throughout the film, Cheryl has a horse tattoo on her left shoulder. However, in the hotel dressing room scene in Oregon, the tattoo disappears.
- From the second to the fifth day, the scrapes on Cheryl's right arm magically heal and then reappear.
- At 43 minutes into the film, when Cheryl is drinking lemonade, the bottle jumps from one hand to the other during a camera angle change.
- The film is based on the novel "Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail" by American writer Cheryl Strayed.
- For the role in this film, Reese Witherspoon turned down a role in "Big Eyes" (2014).
- Initially, this film was planned to be her next project after completing work on "Gone Girl" (2014), but work on it accelerated significantly when Witherspoon decided to forgo the lead role and remain on "Gone Girl" solely as a producer.
- Jean-Marc Vallée was offered the directing position for this project while his film "Dallas Buyers Club" (2013) was still in post-production. Producer Bruna Papandrea is a big fan of his and, after seeing a rough cut of "Dallas Buyers Club" (2013), she immediately contacted him with a formal offer to head the project. Lisa Cholodenko was also considered for the director's role, but she left the project.
- In one scene, Reese Witherspoon's character reads the novel "Gone Girl," which served as the basis for the film of the same name, for which Witherspoon was a producer.
Similar movies
Auditions in India
Casting calls in USA
Castingi w Polsce
Кастинги в Україні
