‘Where The Wild Things Are’ Screen Test Captures Smell Of Childhood In A Bottle

We think most of us are in agreement that Where the Wild Things Are–as far as sacred texts go, basically the Koran of childhood–was in safe hands with Spike Jonze, a filmmaker we fear may have at some point been beaten with a genius stick as hard as Kanye gets it with a shovel in his latest Jonze-helmed music video. (It bears noting that he co-wrote the screenplay with McSweeney’s founder/ co-genius Dave Eggers, offering further promise that Things won’t follow the same road as any number of Seussian big screen disasters.)

The leaked footage above, featuring a quiet moment between the fearsome Max and Wild Thing Carol –rumored to be voiced in the movie by James Gandolfini–was the source of much dispute over the weekend. A few frantic dispatches placed by Warner Bros. to various blogspots, however, has led to the consensus that the scene, bathed in golden hour and possessing a near pitch-perfect tone (try imagining the sub-in actors’ voices replaced with the sound of Tony Soprano talking to a nine-year-old AJ at a Yankee’s game) is, in fact, a screen test. If we start now, we should be able to produce our own offspring in time to accompany us to its opening weekend, at some point in 2009.

• Where the Wild Things Are [IMDB]
• Wild Things Clip [thebadandugly.com]