At a glance it would seem that there is little connection between The Godfather movies and Into the Wild, Sean Penn’s movie based on the story of Christopher McCandless two-year (1990 -1992) wilderness trek that sadly ended in McCandless death in Alaska.
Upon closer look, however, one can draw some similarities in how happiness eludes both Michael Corleone in the end of The Godfather III and Christopher McCandless as he breathes his last on an abandoned school bus in the Alaskan wilderness.
Michael Corleone dies a forlorn figure, disillusioned and pained by the futility of it all. The murders, the schemes, the connivances and for it all to turn so meaningless in the end, so symbolically embodied in the poignant moment at the stair case of the opera house where Michael desperately hangs on to the body of his dying daughter. The sheer anguish on Michael’s face eloquently communes how unworthy the struggle has been.
Likewise, although Christopher McCandless world is not blood-soaked and murky like that of Michael Corleone, he too cuts an all the more forlorn figure, as he lies dying on that hearse of a bus.
The main difference between Into the Wild and The Godfather is encapsulated in that ethereal realization and revelation by McCandless that “happiness only real when shared”.
Though he had achieved his goal of living life on the bare minimum, free of material obsession, and that ideal of all freedoms: the freedom from being pigeonholed into a career and limited by societal expectations dictated by austere needs of a capitalist economy.
The irony of Christopher unfortunately having to pay the ultimate price for his adventurous spirit is not lost on the reader or viewer, as one contemplates the stark contradiction between his initial reaction: “You are wrong if you think that the joy of life comes principally from human relationships. God’s placed it all around us, it’s in everything, in anything we can experience. People just need to change the way they look at those things” and at the end, the stoical reflection: “Happiness only real when shared.”
One may, without contradiction, conclude that while Christopher McCandless adventurous spirit is unquestionable, noble, and indeed admirable; it is hard not to exclaim: ‘what a waste of a life’. That said, his moment of redemption, in fact his gift to the world, is the unequivocally high premium he places on the value of human relations with the prudent words: “Happiness only real when shared”.
If it is hard to imagine the value of the little moments in life if we did not have someone to share our ups and downs with, then it is easy to see the value of relating with those whom we regard as close and dear to our lives.
After all, a lot of the things we often say we are purely doing for ourselves are only worth doing when we know that somebody somewhere will appreciate our effort.
