Climbing Higher Pictures

The world as you know it has ended. You know the drill. Straggling bits of humanity fight for survival without crops or animals to feed on. Instead they start feeding on each other, and roving groups of cannibals arm themselves with whatever weapons they can find in the hopes of surviving in a world that does not warrant the hope. Grey and brown toned color palette ensues, heartbreak and danger lurks around every corner, and you may never want to experience the story every again. What makes this post-apocalyptic film different? It’s based on the acclaimed novel by Cormac McCarthy, author of No Country for Old Men and boasts a number of literary awards as well as quite the fan following. Does John Hillcoat‘s film, delayed over a full year from its original release and dropped by its original distributor, live up to the early praise it has been receiving? Read on:

The Road Review

By Ryan Hamelin

Movie Grade: A

The Road is one of those films which you need to decide to watch when you’re already of a lighthearted disposition. The movie itself is so draining and so demoralizing that trying to watch it while depressed may lead to disastrous results. That isn’t a detriment to the film, but more an evaluation of its potency as a story and as an adaptation. Based on the Cormac McCarthy novel of the same name, the movie stands above and beyond the scope of what the average post-apocalyptic drama can say about human behavior and the reconciliation of a world where society and culture is but a distant memory. It doesn’t re-invent the wheel, and borrows a little bit too heavily in its cinematography and color palette from the myriad of similar films that have emerged in recent years, but not unlike Children of Men, it invokes the kind of deeper thought and reflection which pushes the medium in a new direction.

Viggo Mortensen hasn’t taken many rolls since his starring turn as Aragorn in Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings trilogy. When he does choose to act, it’s because he’s found a script which has the kind of character development that shows his versatility as an actor. He is our rock within this film, the guardian angel for his son and the light in the darkness for the audience. Without believing in him, without fearing for his well-being, and without understanding the kind of madness which would allow a man to keep fighting after all the things he was once attached to are gone, there would be no film to watch, and it is Mortensen’s incredible performance that keeps our eyes glued to the screen. Though the film can drag on occasion and I felt myself inclined towards checking my watch, I kept coming back to the passion that was captured in those frames of celluloid and marveled at the level of honesty in his performance. Come Oscar season, this could one to watch for.

This brings me to the subject of Charlize Theron. In the novel, the character of The Wife barely exists, even in passing, and apparently she barely existed in the first cut of the film either. In the intervening year since its original release date, a series of reshoots went underway to beef up her character and make her presence in the film, though still very brief, a much more memorable role. Whatever they did, it works beautifully. I couldn’t tell you where they diverged from the book, or where they manufactured back-story wholesale to reveal the series of events which result in her not accompanying the husband and the son on their quest to the coast, but having such an important character realized in those flashback sequences gave the entire movie a sadness and a hopelessness that went beyond the film. Scenes which would have only mattered on the shallowest levels in the original cut carry a depth to them that the audience can feel, even subconsciously, with the added information and development.

This is the real deal. An adaptation which doesn’t shy away from the brutal darkness that helped make its source material a literary classic. Would I ever want to watch it again? Probably not. But having experienced The Road once, I can say that its psychological and emotional effects will leave you questioning what you’ve just experienced for hours after the fact. Know what you’re dealing with, prepare yourself as best you can, and take a trip through the ash-ridden streets of a desolate wasteland in an effort to learn just as much about this world as you will about yourself. Just be careful, they may not be the kind of answers you’re looking for.