Shelved for over a year by the studio, allegedly biding its time for the right release strategy to snap up an Oscar nod, it's more plausible (and understandable) that they simply had difficulties in selling a no-assurance movie like The Road to a wide audience. That it finally gets a release the day before Thanksgiving is peculiar and somewhat ironic. While it does promote familial bond and being thankful for what you have (because you might lose it), its derelict setting and gloomy atmosphere are surely counter to a festive gathering?
It's relentless almost to a fault. One of the reasons the film is so hard to endure is how subdued it is in utilizing all of a motion picture's faculties. The assured cinematography and vivid art design work together to intentionally create a drab and unbearably dull look—the prominent color of the film being ash. It's also a deathly quiet film that rids itself of earthly ambiance, which, you've got to admit, adds an audience barrier as much as it establishes the foreboding aura it uses so brilliantly to its advantage.
"Post-apocalypse" is one of filmland's often-used landscape, but The Road has a way of setting itself apart by not focusing on the destruction (28 Days Later, 2012) or establish a new operating world (Mad Max, The Matrix). It focuses on endurance against fictional threats in forms we're already familiar with today: hunger, homelessness, distrust and desperation. The Road's apocalypse is unspecific and gradual—not as important as those left behind.
Our guides are a Man (Viggo Mortensen) and a Boy (Kodi Smit-McPhee)—neither of them given names—who stay one step ahead of death on a dying Earth. As the world withers around them, they head south along the East Coast, hoping that their oceanside destination would provide better living conditions. Emphasis on hope.
There are cannibals patrolling the roads for food—them—but for the two, flesh-eaters seem to be the least of their problems. The Man is constantly tormented by dreams of better days, when his wife (Charlize Theron) was still alive and surviving wasn't so literal. In a breath-stealing scene, he forces himself into throwing away his wedding ring off a bridge, to shed the one remaining reminder of his pain. We can see how troubling it is for him as he slowly pushes it off the edge with one finger, as opposed to tossing it. It's this that The Road does best, portraying broad human suffering using small gestures.
The Boy, born just as the apocalypse hit, knows only the end of the world. He has no concept of a better time, yet he's the strongest character in the story. "We're never going to become the bad guys, right?" he begs. It's that indomitable spirit that keeps this kind of story from being exploitative. It's a high-wire act that director John Hillcoat and writer Joe Penhall keep at balance, transferring the sentiment of Cormac McCarthy's novel to the actors' performances without making it sentimental. They only mostly succeed, but mostly is plenty here.
The father-son relationship is the emotional core of the film. It can be very sweet but it can also be very unsettling. Sometimes it's both. One of the film's most effective scenes comes early into it: the Man and the Boy wander into a barn and discover a family hanged. The Boy asks his father what happened. He doesn't mince his words explaining. They committed suicide.
"Why?"
"You know why."
It's a depressing honesty that really packs a punch, of a father who trusts his son enough to not shield him from what the world is like, but not enough to let him out of his sight. Later, the Man teaches his son how to commit suicide in case the cannibals capture him. The Road doesn't discredit that option as a weak option, but hammers the need for people to hold on a little longer, carried by the amazing believability in Viggo's performance.
Their haggard appearance, wrapped in dirty winter wear and pushing their belongings in a shopping cart, resemble that of common street bums. That's not without consideration, either. For two gripping hours, we watch them pine for any scrap of food, brace harsh winter nights, sleep in abandoned cars, scared sick of what lurks in the days ahead. It's all so science-fiction, yet so uncomfortably familiar.
We're living in an era that makes it so. Forget the environmental threats this movie is likely to rouse. The economic drop and housing market are already a suitable comparison, with people facing the very same challenges the Man and the Boy have to overcome. While society haven't quite reached the point of actual cannibalism, business practices are showing a monetary equivalent. Survival is survival, all the same. A movie that underlines the need to appreciate the things being taken for granted goes a long way—bleak as it is—to provide a thought-provoking commentary of humanity's scary, scary (potential) descent.
I'm not sure it's a step forward in terms of achievement for Hillcoat, compared to his previous feature The Proposition, which had more visual elegance, richer characters and smoother storyline, but The Road does have its own clout. Even at its coldest, there's an undeniable and overwhelming warmth.
"The Road" opens November 25, 2009 and is rated R. Drama, Sci-Fi, Thriller. Directed by John Hillcoat. Written by Cormac McCarthy (novel), Joe Penhall (screenplay). Starring Charlize Theron, Guy Pearce, Kodi Smit McPhee, Michael K Williams, Robert Duvall, Viggo Mortensen.
