DVD Reviews

The Road – DVD Review

By Frankie Dees May 31, 2010, 15:52 GMT

From Cormac McCarthy, author of No Country For Old Men, comes the highly anticipated big screen adaptation of the beloved, best-selling and Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, The Road. An all-star cast are featured in this epic post-apocalyptic tale of the survival of a father and his young son as they journey across a barren America that was destroyed by a mysterious cataclysm. A masterpiece adventure, The Road boldly imagines a future ...more

An adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s 2006 bestseller of the same name (my favorite book of a couple years), my expectations were reasonably high and director John Hillcoat was able to portray the barren post-apocalyptic landscapes beautifully.

Sadly, the emotional core of the film comes up a bit short in comparison.

This result is all the more perplexing considering that all the right pieces seemed to be in place.

The novel, a sparse simplistic story of a father and son on ‘The Road’ to find hope in a destitute and decimated Eastern American coastland amongst roving bands of ‘bad guys’, seemed tailor-made for an affecting cinematic adaptation with individual scenes literally jumping off the page in vivid description.

And aesthetically, I couldn’t have asked for a better portrayal with both the infertile, color-drained look of the film from cinematographer Javier Aquirresarobe and the cast with Viggo Mortensen being perfect for the hollowed-out, haunted father and smaller parts being filled by accomplished pro’s like Robert Duvall and Guy Pearce. Director John Hillcoat was also an inspired choice whose previous pic ‘The Proposition’ was an Aussie Western almost seems like it was based on a McCarthy novel.

So why does the film not quite work for me dramatically? I honestly can’t be sure even though the last few minutes of the film do indeed work on the same level of the book.

I imagine it’s more that reading the book first and being caught up in the sweeping prose of McCarthy builds up a mind’s eye world and tension that a film adaptation (any adaptation) would be hard-pressed to match. I also wasn’t as taken with the rapport between Mortensen and the actor playing his son Kodi Smit-McPhee.

They were great in single scenes and generally with other actors but something was missing in their chemistry as a whole, a chemistry that is key to the film working. The flashbacks have been expanded on to allow more screen-time for Charlize Theron as the wife/mother.

However, little is said in these scenes other than the most basic set-up of why father and son left their home to go south to the sea (warmer, they won’t survive another winter) with nothing but a revolver and two bullets.

This world seems to have divided into two groups of survivors; what I’m calling the ‘roamers’ (a ‘Fallout’ reference for all you vidgame fans out there and whose worlds seem similar), gangs that have given up on the most simplistic of morals and have turned to cannibalism for survival and the people that are just looking for the next reason to justify their existence be it an old can of coke or the glimpse of a ocean where better things might await.

One of the most nail-biting scenes from the book involve father and son taking refuge in what looked like an abandoned house only to find a cellar of ghastly, malnourished people ready to be brought up for the slaughter.

The film peculiarly tones this sequence down possibly to keep the film from coming across as pure horror but that’s kind of what the film needs: an injection shot of pure tension.

What does work emotionally is the ending which is arguably the most important sequence in the film to get right as well as the father and son run-ins with Robert Duvall’s old blind man whose minutes of screen-time single-handedly makes the film worth watching and the beach thief played Michael K. Williams whose desperation speech is heartbreaking.

The film is presented with a 2.35:1 anamorphic transfer and looks fine but the intentionally muted color palette doesn’t exactly sparkle on-screen. Special Features are a bit slight but worth checking out.

First up is a commentary from director John Hillcoat who has a lot of production stories to share and makes for an engaging host. Six minutes of Deleted Scenes and a 14-minute making of round things out.

For those that have read the book, it gets certain elements right enough to recommend as a curiosity watch but it didn’t (or most likely could it) match the emotional resonance of the book. For those not familiar with the book, I would be interested to know if the film would work better or if the world is just too damn bleak to pass as entertainment. A cautious recommendation for both I guess.