'Wild': How the Movie Differs from the Book
Reese Witherspoon in Wild
The big-screen adaptation of Cheryl Strayed’s hiking memoir Wild opened in select theaters last Friday. Reese Witherspoon stars as Strayed, an emotionally wrecked (and woefully underprepared) young woman who straps on a massive backpack and hits the daunting hills and dales of the Pacific Crest Trail, where she plans to walk from California to Washington state. One of the remarkable things about director Jean-Marc Vallée’s adaptation is just how faithful it is to Strayed’s meandering, moving book. The movie’s first scene, for example — in which Strayed loses a hiking boot and then hurls the other one off a cliff in frustration — is such an accurate recreation of the book’s opening, that you might wonder if Strayed herself directed it. However, there were definitely some key changes made from page to screen. Here’s some of the ones we noticed. (Warning: spoilers to follow)
Hitching a ride
At the very beginning of her trip in the book, Cheryl flies to Los Angeles and gets a ride to the starting point in Mojave with the brother of a friend. In the movie, her driver gets an upgrade: The real-life Strayed drops Witherspoon’s Cheryl off in a quick cameo.
Family ties
While Laura Dern’s heartbreaking portrayal of Strayed’s mother sticks close to the book, some of Strayed’s family didn’t make the cut: Her older sister Karen and step-father Eddie aren’t in the movie, which pares the fractured family down to just Cheryl, her mom, and her younger brother Lief.
Money trouble
While the movie Cheryl only occasionally mentions her lack of funds, the real-life Strayed was constantly aware of living close to the bone, unable to buy even a cup of coffee at one point. In one memorable scene in the book that didn’t make it into the movie, she gets thrown out of a campground in the middle of the night when she doesn’t have the money to pay the overnight fee.
That scary water break
Strayed really did almost dehydrate near the beginning of her trip when a trail refill tank turned up empty, and she did indeed have to filter water from a muddy, putrid hole. But that’s not when she runs into the two creepy hunters. The menacing encounter comes much later towards the end of her trip.
The missing raven feather
Many of Cheryl’s encounters on the trail make it into the movie, but one key buddy is missing: the gallant Doug who she describes as a “golden boy.” In the book, Cheryl first meets Doug and his hiking partner Tom in Kennedy Meadows and forms a fast friendship. Doug gives Cheryl a raven’s feather as a token of his esteem and the boys even invite Cheryl to join them, though she declines.
She later happens to meet up with them again in a joyous reunion near Mt. Hood, before saying a final goodbye to finish her journey alone. In a book full of brief but meaningful relationships, Doug stands as the most wistful of them all — particularly when you get to the memoir’s final pages and learn two things: That Doug died nine years later in an accident, and that Cheryl still has her backpack hanging in the basement, with a ragged raven feather attached to it.
What, no ice cream?
The ending of the movie is pretty faithful to the book, sticking with Strayed’s pensive voiceover as she reaches the end of her hike at the Bridge of the Gods in Cascade Locks, Oregon. One thing that’s missing though: Her celebratory ice cream cone from the East Wind Drive-In. Every good journey deserves some soft serve.
What else did you notice? Let us know in the comments.
Watch a clip from Wild:
