MUST SEE: 'Wildlike'
Frank Hall Green WRITER PRODUCER DIRECTOR
SYNOPSIS
14-year-old Mackenzie is sent by her mom from her home in Seattle to spend the summer with her uncle in Juneau, Alaska. His kindness is almost overwhelming as he welcomes her into his Juneau, Alaska home but still a foreboding hangs over the home and their relationship. Mackenzie longs for her struggling absent mother. As her mom's phone calls become less frequent and her Uncle's care becomes anything but caring, she must flee. With no one to turn to, Mackenzie runs away after a hike around a local Juneau glacier. On her own and haunted by desperate phone calls and text messages from her Uncle, Mackenzie escapes into the town of Juneau which she soon discovers is not an easy place to escape being cut off from everywhere by the sea and mountains.
Seeking a way back to Seattle, Mackenzie encounters Rene Bartlett while hiding out at a motel. He is gruff and keeps to himself and wants nothing more than to be on his own. Learning that Bartlett is also from Seattle, Mackenzie secretly follows him in hopes of getting home to Washington. But Bartlett is not headed home. Kenzie tracks Bartlett for many hours and miles onto a ferryboat, up the coast, through Anchorage into the Alaska interior, finally arriving at Denali National Park.
After an unsettling night at a lodge, a tour bus takes Bartlett and a trailing Mackenzie dozens of miles into the Denali mountains. When the bus makes a rest stop, Mackenzie makes a rash decision. Fully equipped for days backpacking, Bartlett does not follow the other tourists back onto the bus, and Mackenzie does not either. After a confrontation, Mackenzie, in the midst of a remote and rugged wilderness, willfully and manipulatively sets out on her own hiking aimlessly into the wilderness. With no other solution and fearing her safety, Bartlett follows Mackenzie, eventually taking the lead and finding his own way as he attempts to help Mackenzie find hers. Mackenzie and Bartlett hike together and prove to be the unlikely salve for each other's scars, until the damage Mackenzie carries with her threatens to destroy her newfound sanctuary. Returning to civilization, Mackenzie is once again at risk of capture by her uncle as the now alarmed Bartlett attempts to turn the runaway into the police. Meanwhile Uncle cannot be kept at bay with manipulative calls, messages and his own police search. When Bartlett finally discovers her alarming secret, he must make a bold choice to take real responsibility for Mackenzie and help her escape her traumatic past.