"They set along the blacktop in the gun-metal light, shuffling through the ash, each the other's world entire."

This also illustrates the sheer nature of darkness the planet is suffering, with no sense of colour; everything is black and grey with no sign of hope. Each location within the movie keeps this sense of greyness, what I saw on screen is how I imagined it to be when I read the novel last year. The description of the "gun-metal light" just instantly painted a picture in my mind, as I imagined the man and the boy journeying down the road, among all the ash and destruction.

As mentioned earlier the story is primarily focused entirely on the boy and his father, however other characters do appear at certain points. The encounters are highly mixed as different people are shown to be dealing with the dying planet in different ways, which would be expected if such an event were to take place. After most of the encounters the boy constantly asks his father if they are the good guys, after certain extreme encounters the boy even wonders if they have become the bad guys. Due to the state of the planet, some have been lead to extreme desperation and even cannibalism as the fight for survival gets harder and harder. It would be easy to put those with hostilities towards the man and the boy in the category of being bad, but the man certainly doesn’t have perfect morals.

At one stage when they reach the coast a lone traveller steals some supplies, the man then takes back the supplies and everything else the traveller owns. In essence the man leaves the traveller for dead, so as with all the other survivors the man is simply doing what he must to survive and protect his son, despite the moral implications. It shows the level of desperation and makes you wonder how far you would go if something of this magnitude actually devastated the earth.

The boy represents the humanity which is slowly dying away along with the planet. Despite the grave fear he has, this does not stop him from questioning his father who at times, acts in a questionable manner. At one stage they come across an old man named Eli, travelling the road on his own. The man wants to continue on and leave Eli however the boy persuades his father to give the old man some food, despite having very little for themselves. The boy shows a huge level of compassion and selflessness, he clearly genuinely wants to help those in need, despite being in the same situation himself. Eli looks upon the boy as a symbol of hope calling him an angel. On a number of occasions the man believes the boy carries the fire inside, which many critics of the novel have suggested represents the fire of humanity, burning on and not being extinguished by the dysfunction brought upon the world.

Throughout the movie we see various montages of the man and the boy travelling the road. Over the montage Viggo Mortensen reads certain passages from the novel, word for word as it appears in McCarthy’s novel. This really reflects how the words of McCarthy are so powerful; his descriptions really do allow the reader to create a mental image of the devastated landscape. In addition conversations between the man and the boy are kept at a complete minimum just like during the novel. The movie has therefore remained true to the original vision of the story. Sometimes Hollywood influence can take a perfectly good storyline; pack it to the brim with special effects and despite there being a lot of action, the essence of the story is tarnished. The overwhelming point of The Road is to comment on the intense emotions of the man and the boy; I believe that is why the cause of the devastation is so minimal in McCarthy’s novel, as it aims to point out that the story is primarily centred on a father and son with a will to survive. If the cause had been revealed there would have been a significant risk of taking attention away from the main point of the story. It is refreshing to see something like this, relying on the portrayal of human emotion and not special effects. For example we have Avatar which has been packed full of special effects, fair enough it is visually stunning but let’s face it Avatar is really nothing greatly unique.

Whilst watching The Road I couldn’t help but think about the recent disaster which has taken place in Haiti. On January 12th 2010 an earthquake measuring 7.0 in magnitude struck at 4:53pm local time, it is thought the death toll may be as high as 200,000 people. The devastation left thousands of survivors without access to essentials such as food and water, this lead to many fending for themselves, in a fight for survival as aide efforts were delayed. Here we have a scene of complete devastation and simply a human will to survive in the face of such destruction. When I went to see The Road only 10 days after the Haiti disaster I just thought about the pictures I had seen of the Haiti crisis and thought about the realism the story of The Road presents.

In conclusion The Road brings out fears that the world is by no means eternal. The reason McCarthy wrote this book was because he looked to his son one day, then scanned the world around him. He imagined the world in ruins and how humans could survive on such a devastated planet. He thought that such an eventuality was not beyond the realms of possibility, especially when you consider discussion with regards to climate change. What we do to the world now has an everlasting effect, which will be felt by future generations; therefore should we all consider taking more responsibility. I believe that is the warning the story of The Road carries.

John Hillcoat has captured Cormac McCarthy’s vision perfectly and ‘The Road’ gains a UFO Radio rating of 9/10 for a thought provoking movie of intense human emotion.

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