Karry Best movie of this year hands down!
HottWwjdIam There is just so much movie here. For some it may be too much. But in the same secretly sarcastic way most telemarketers say the phrase, the title of this one is particularly apt.
Alasdair Orr Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.
Quiet Muffin This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.
Wuchak Released in 1997 and directed by William Dear, "Wild America" is a family adventure about three Arkansas brothers in the late 60s, Marshall, Marty and Mark Stouffer (Jonathan Taylor Thomas, Scott Bairstow and Devon Sawa respectively), who dream of becoming nature filmmakers. Their dream comes true when their parents (Jamey Sheridan and s Fisher) allow them to travel America, filming alligators, moose, grizzly bears and more. Don Stroud, Tracey Walter, Zack Ward and Claudia Stedelin have peripheral roles.The movie's based on the true-life story of the brothers who went on to become big-time nature photographers, particularly Marty Stouffer, who directed the Wild America TV series (I even have a couple of those VHS tapes somewhere). The movie was released two months before the excellent "The Edge" was released, but don't expect anything within the realm of quality as that movie. Don't get me wrong, there is some good in "Wild America," it's just offset by the BAD.The good includes an effective cast and stellar locations, not to mention a glorified cameo by an actor whom I'm not going to name, but he was a fairly big-time actor at the time. There's also some quality animal photography. Unfortunately, the kinks weren't worked out in the script. For instance, near the end the youngest brother has some mature dialogue that no kid his age would ever speak (both my wife and I thought this). Furthermore, the story has no narrative drive and so when the plane sequence occurs in the third act it's simply not moving or believable (although I enjoyed the sky photography). Speaking of unbelievable, there are three animal sequences that utterly destroy any suspension of disbelief: The moose sequence, the snake scene and, the worst, the entire bear cave episode, which almost single-handedly ruins the movie. Then there's the boys' film that was shown at their school. While this may have really happened I can guarantee you that the film looked nothing like what is shown.Bottom Line: "Wild America" might be good for pubescent girls who are fond of the teenage protagonists and entertained by the fun antics, but adults will be turned-off by the lack of story drive and realism.The film runs 106 minutes and was shot in South Carolina (Jasper County), Georgia (Rincon & Tybee Island), Arkansas (Fort Smith), Utah (Monument Valley), Arizona (Sedona) and Alberta, Canada.GRADE: C-
William Porter I believe in grading movies on a curve. This one is not in the same class as Citizen Kane or Fargo or Some Like It Hot. Instead this is a low-budget and somewhat corny—okay, pretty corny—family film like, oh, Because of Winn-Dixie. And graded on the curve appropriate for that class, this is at least an 8 out of 10. I'll be honest, my wife is the one who ordered this from Netflix and I didn't want to see it. I had Gosford Park in the DVD tray ready to go. But my wife thought our 15-year old would enjoy Wild America more, and our daughter agreed. I was outnumbered. So we watched this film.I didn't know anything about it. We were a good 10 minutes or more into the film before I put the family's last name (Stouffer) together with the first name of the oldest son (Marty) and realized, "Hey, I know who this kid is: It's Marty Stouffer of..." D'oh.Anyway, I expect that the real adventures of the real Marty and his brothers weren't quite as colorful as those of the characters in the film. But there were a good combination of excitement (and from some unlikely sources, like F-14 jets dropping bombs) and genuine humor. I laughed hard again and again.Special effects? Well, I'll just say, it ain't Jurassic Park. I think the animal props were rented from a budget prop store in Atlanta. But it didn't matter. I enjoyed the film a lot. Do what I did, get some fresh hot pizza, sit back with your spouse and a kid or two, and enjoy it yourself.
glenford5 I recently watched this movie on a Sunny Sunday morning whilst in bed, sounds very ideological, but is true. I must say I do not believe it is all that bad. OK at times the screenplay does stray away from it's original context and the stereotypical WASP family may reinforce unrealistic portrayals of Hollywood, but with this, with a little effort on our behalf, we the audience can allow ourselves to be whisked away into the young boys adventure, out of the harsh realities of life. When analysed, issues of father and son relationships and the transition of boy to manhood become quite clear. Taking into consideration that the film was made nearly ten years ago, I feel it serves importantly as balance between strong realism and fairy tale.
MovieAddict2016 "Wild America" is definitely not a great film, but it's okay. There are some interesting moments, but I found that the over-bearing sentimentality and cuteness mixed with adult content -- adult to a certain degree -- to be confusing. One tends to wonder if the film is adult, or family. Things are thrown around too much. First it's adult subject matter, then it's a broken heart moment filled with overly-sentimental acting. "Wild America" fills my list of "family films that couldn't decide to be adult or not".2.5/5 stars. If you want to see good parts, just fast-forward to scenes with the wild animals chasing the kids. It's fun to watch--John Ulmer
