It’s the day after I have seen the midnight showing of Spike Jonze’s “Where the Wild Things Are,” and I literally find myself howling like one of the wild things. I’m not howling in excitement but rather in sadness and confusion as I contemplate the film and wonder where it went wrong.

In 1963, there arose a children’s book from the genius author/illustrator Maurice Sendak that would leave its mark in literary history. What made the book so memorable was that it said so much by saying so little, a hallmark of all great children’s books. Although the book can only be found to have a total of ten lines, the story was able to transport readers into a new realm of imagination.

Sadly, I find myself second-guessing whether I had too high of expectations for the film adaptation of the beloved children’s novel. Spike Jonze, who directed and co-wrote the film, is, without a doubt in my mind, one of the most enthralling directors of the last fifteen or twenty years. Despite having only released three films so far, he has clearly become one of the film industry’s premiere filmmakers. So I had no worries about Jonze adapting the book – in fact I was overwhelmed with joy.

Visually, “Where the Wild Things Are” is the best looking film I have seen this decade. What Jonze has done with his long-standing director of photography, Lance Acord, is set a new standard for combining both visual and special effects that never once hinders the quality of the film’s artistic nature.

The combination brings to life a world where the main character, Max (Max Records), is both suppressor of and suppressed by his own wild imagination, which is embodied by not only the wild things themselves, but also the entire world which surrounds him. It is a world where rules and regulations cease to exist and where Jonze is able to show just how far his cinematic eye can extend beyond what many filmmakers would see. Nothing else can be done to make “Where the Wild Things Are” look more unique than it already does. In this, the film was able to meet my very high expectations.

However, this is the marking point of where the film stops meeting my high expectations and begins to come up short of my hopes and dreams.

What is a beautiful looking film without an equally beautifully crafted story? Well, it’s a beautiful mess, and this is what “Where the Wild Things Are” turns out to be at times.
If you have read the book and know the story of how Max gets in trouble, sent to bed, transported to new world, raises havoc, and then finds himself back at home, then you know about 75 percent of the film’s plot. You would expect a 100 minute film to have more to its plot than the ten line book that it is based on, but this is not so with “Where the Wild Things Are”.

Instead, the film pretty much follows the same simple story that developed in a mere ten sentences. Since watching the film takes a much longer time than reading the book, the story is milked as much as possible. There is some back-story supplied in the film, but what is added is very limited and lacks the depth I was expecting.

Max finds himself emotionally separated from his older sister and his mother (Catherine Keener) due to his mother being too preoccupied with her boyfriend. It sounds interesting, but hardly any time is spent developing this emotional separation. It is hard to even care for Max’s frustrations.

Not much can be said about the character development either. The wild things have been given names for the film, and they have a little more depth to them now, some more than others, but that’s about it. Such shallow character development is not very good considering most of the film is spent with Max and his ferocious friends. To give the film some credit, there is some odd-ball humor which made me feel a bit like a kid again, as well as a few moments which actually moved me in the same way that many of the fantasy films of my generation had done before.

Before I sign off on the film entirely, I must admit there is something about it that makes me want to see it again and give it a second chance. For now though, I find myself howling in confusion towards the film that was rather than in joy over the film that should have been.