There are a lot of ways to do post-apocalyptic. However, it is always important to make sure the world is complete. This means that everything must be adequately explained or adequately unexplained. Most importantly, why people are forced to live the way they live and whether or not there may be alternative lifestyles must be fully addressed. If the problem is food it should be explained either subtly or plainly why food can’t grow. Is it because there isn’t water or is it because there isn’t enough light. If there isn’t enough light there are some extra problems to take into account. For instance many edible plants don’t require that much light anyway. As long as there is electricity or fuel, it is also possible to grow plants indoors. It may even be possible to use mirrors or lenses to collect greater quantities of light. Personally, I’m not sure The Road did a thorough enough job of addressing some of these issues. Besides, the film creates the problem of explaining some things outright but leaving other things vague. There is even a moment in the film where one of the characters says “What’s happening?” during whatever it is that happened, but the question is never really answered. Supposedly, things are better at the equator. We never know if there really is a great valley out there. The film uses the analogy of carrying the fire to encompass its philosophical purpose. It is about the journey but without this final destination being proven to be real the journey and the ethical decisions made during are in vain. Unless, as is perhaps the point, you believe that there is some sort of afterlife that matters more than the survival of mankind. I for one do not think that this is good enough. While it isn’t necessary to know whether humanity survives, it is important to know whether survival is possible or not. This makes it possible to judge whether or not the characters’ actions are in vein or not. Many characters in The Road give up. These characters seem ethically superior to those who cannibalize but ethically inferior to those who try to find long term survival, but if long term survival is or is not possible in this world it changes everything. Instead we are left with a half explanation of what exactly is wrong and a vague reason to think that survival is possible. We are told that the world is dying but we are not told why, whether this is absolute, or what can be done fix the problem. In any case, the ethical issues explored in the film are interesting but the world seems incomplete. Children of Men ends in a similarly incomplete manner, but there are some minute but important differences. By the time the film ends we know that survival is possible. What hangs in the balance is whether humanity will destroy itself or save itself. If in The Road survival is not possible regardless, the spark or fire that still exists in at least a handful of humans will die. Nothing matters. We need to know if the hope that manifests itself in the film is valid or not. I don’t think that hope for survival without the actual possibility of survival is valuable. The film in its vagueness may be saying that it is. If the point of the film is supposed to be that ethical acts are still valuable even without the hope of long term survival I think that the analogy of carrying the fire was the wrong the wrong one to use.
Here are some films that it satisfactorily. Zombie Land has a promised land and conclusively answers the question of whether or not it actually exists as well as whether or not survival is possible. A Boy and His Dog shows that survival is possible and makes ethical issues more important. Many others such as Mad Max, 28 Days Later, etc explain that survival is possible and explore the ethical issues involved. The Road appears to be the same type of film as The Land Before Time, where survival is at stake as well as the quality of character of those that survive. For films about individuals carrying the hope for their species, it is important to establish whether or not it is possible for them to succeed. If it isn’t possible for them to succeed, the film should not end or depend on messages of hope and survival. Instead it should do justice to the entire legacy and attempt to survive all the way up until the death (or supposed death) of the heroes as Cloverfield does. Lastly, I think that in general it is best to leave God out of the apocalypse and leave science in.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that over the course of a film a point or question is necessarily developed. It should be definitively answered or defined as unanswerable. Leaving answerable questions unanswered or leaving the established world arbitrarily undefined in some vital aspects but not others is annoying. I know that in The Road we are only closely following a few characters, but it seems that there should be a lot of useful information available to them and to us about what is happening to their world that simply isn’t shared for no apparent reason. Are they plot holes?
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