Where The Sullen Depressives Are

Click it HERE to watch a snippet of Spike Jonze's Where The Wild Things Are.

UPDATE- The clip has been pulled from AICN. Such is life on the internet. You can probably find it somewhere else, but you'll have to Google that for yourself.

Now let's discuss.

I have high hopes for this adaptation. The writer/director combo of Dave Eggers and Spike Jonze was enough to sell me. Then came that excellent still. Now this little piece of unfinished film. AICN says this is pretty much what we can expect the final product to look like, but that soundtrack definitely sounds like it will go through some tweaking. There is a pleasing feel to this (even if that monster sounds like he could use some Prozac). It's in the way the kid acts like a real kid. It's in the cinematography that reminds me of the filmed segments on Sesame Street circa 1976.

The recent Dr. Seuss debacles have demonstrated how difficult it is to turn a scant childrens book into a feature length film. Those flicks were padded out with obnoxious filler that undermined the source material. Where The Wild Things Are poses an even greater challenge. We're talking about a book ten sentences long. Dave Eggers has a lot of room to fill between pages. But so far he seems up to the task. His writing style is even similar to that of the book. Maurice Sendak's sentences flow for pages before finding themselves at a period.

Of course it's too early to start rolling out the accolades. But I can tell you this much- I'd choose that clip over Horton Hears A Who every time.

That pic courtesy of www.IWatchStuff.com