Anyone else seen this? I thought it was excellent, and contained some of the more moving scenes I can remember. There's some potent stuff in this movie.

Emile Hirsch was good in the lead, not exactly how I imagined Chris McCandless after reading the book, but he fits well in his own way. Sometimes he struggles to sell lines like "I'm going to paraphrase Thoreau here..." But he projects an appealing intensity, and is genuinely likeable in the film.

The photography is incredible, and Sean Penn's direction is really assured, like he's made many more films than he has. All the supporting cast was great, esp. Catherine Keener and Vince Vaughan. Hal Holbrook gives a masterful performance--his scenes with Hirsch contain genuine magic, and I teared up at a few moments.

Most of the less positive reviews seemed to disagree with how CM was portrayed; they felt he was more of an overconfident idiot than the flawed but admirable person Penn presents him as. As far as the actual filmmaking, there are few detractors.

I highly recommend reading the book first, which is pretty short and an engaging read. Then see the film...it's well worth it.

I enjoyed it a great deal.

I can't believe 74 people looked at this and didn't post a reply. It's definitely a movie worth checking out. I thought Hal Halbrook was great as well, hope he gets a best Supporting Nod (but loses to Javier Bardem).