Finally was able to watch “The Road” last night. So many thoughts about the movie and the book, by Cormac McCarthy, but altogether thought they were both very well done. I read the book accidentally a couple years ago, and never got a chance to see the movie in theaters. I waited patiently.
In an entertainment culture that wants their sequences and plot lines about the same as they want their drive through order: fast, cheap, super sized, and without much thought/nutrition to it…here is a story that is counter-culture. Borderline boring, at some points, but never quite going over the edge.
But seriously. Society collapsed years ago, there’s no signs of new life anywhere, despair and hunger fill almost every moment that fills the screen…..how much flashy excitement would you risk trying to shove in there? It’s a genuine movie/story. A father and son journeying toward a hope that lies always beyond their reach.
As they travel, we see a world that hasn’t seen new life in many years. Trees are falling spontaneously, the sky is gray everywhere, and they attempt to keep from resorting to cannibalism like so many others have. I suppose that’s the one caveat to the film – it can be intensely disturbing at some points. Also his solid dedication to protecting his son, who embodies the only hope that pulls him forward. I imagine that’s what earned the “R” rating, along with some of the language. Not to mention a couple scenes where he jumps into the water and you see his bare rear in the distance. I’d say if your TEEN wants to watch it….watch it with them to discuss together. Definitely not appropriate for younger audiences.
But in a world where most ratings of this nature come from mindless, purposeless, struggles for our money…this one is earned by simply portraying brutally genuine scenes of a world that has lost life, green, newness, and almost all hope.
If ever there was a movie that captured how much our current world is in need of God bringing together Heaven and Earth and making all things NEW, of bringing life from death, of a world desperate and hungry for something “Other” to move….here is one.
Come, Lord Jesus.
words from wick 