What it’s about: Adapted from Cormac McCarthy’s 2006 novel (which I have not yet read and can’t speak to), the film follows an unnamed father (Mortensen) and son (Smit-McPhee) surviving after an unclear apocalyptic event. With no animals and no way to grow crops, any strain of civilization has disappeared and the man struggles with not passing on the trauma and loss he’s experienced while preparing his son for a dying world of cannibals, thieves, and the constant threat of starvation.

Reflections: In the first five minutes of this film, we see a father instructing his prepubescent son on how to commit suicide, if and when it becomes the only option, which pretty much sets the tone for the rest of the movie. It’s a difficult ask for an audience, to spend nearly two hours in a world essentially devoid of any hope or light. On a literal level, the visual experience of the film is a muddy, hazy mix of grey and brown that does not shy away from muck and gore. And metaphorically, what few glimpses of warmth exist in the film’s scant characters are still tinged with despair, anger, and cynicism acted out by men who lack the tools–emotionally and materially–to stand up to the moment, even when their hearts are in the right place. It falls almost entirely on the boy to carry any kind of connection to the material, and that’s a lot of weight to put on a kid.

Smit-McPhee is up to the task though, giving a really strong child performance and letting us in to a perspective that has never experienced anything but this harshness and is aware of and frustrated by the difference between what he’s being told is important and what his father often chooses to do. Mortensen also does a lot of great work here, but the best of it is in reaction, and while the supporting cast is excellent, none of them stick around. The subtle, aching score by Nick Cave and Warren Ellis also offers a little relief, staying out of the way, but lifting quiet moments up on long string tones like rays of sunshine. And the ending manages to not sell either itself or the viewer out, offering at least a crumb of possibility to cling to.

There are moments that are a little awkward and saccharine, but that is part of the film’s effectiveness, I think, part of the stiffness of the father character in particular. That effectiveness is going to be a matter of taste and mood for a lot of people; it’s slow, interior, and a profound bummer to actually sit and watch. But there is catharsis in facing darkness also, and this is tightly crafted to facilitate that.