Witherspoon isn't really known as a gritty actress, so many worried that she'd be miscast as Cheryl (at least the Cheryl in flashbacks who has casual hook-ups and shoots up drugs), but it's clear she was all in for this performance, baring her body and giving every scene her best.
Because that's what this movie is about - a woman with lots of emotional baggage who doesn't know a thing about serious trekking but manages to go from greenhorn to seasoned queen of the PCT. Wild isn't a movie for anyone who hates stories of how hitting the road, climbing a mountain, or setting off for an adventure can lift the spirit and cleanse the soul. Although she encounters others on and off the trail, the movie, even more than the book, focuses on Cheryl battling her demons with every labored step. During her solo trek, Cheryl reflects on her past, both the good (her beautiful mother and Cheryl's faithful and long-suffering ex-husband) and the bad (her mother's death, Cheryl's string of affairs and subsequent drug abuse). Her goal? To once again become the woman that her dearly departed mother ( Laura Dern) raised her to become, rather than the shell of a person she'd become. Once her divorce is final, she's off heroin, and she's aborted an unplanned pregnancy, Cheryl decides to pack an oversized backpack with newly purchased camping gear and hike 1,000 miles of the trail. In her mid-20s and in a state of crisis, Cheryl Strayed ( Reese Witherspoon) sees a PCT guidebook while shopping for pregnancy tests in a pharmacy. Like the memoir on which it's based, WILD is a touching exploration of a woman's life-changing 1,000-mile hike along the Pacific Crest Trail.