Against all odds
Melora Koepke
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Mortensen and Smit-McPhee follow The Road
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The Road star - and Habs fan - Viggo Mortensen on the futility, and necessity, of hope
Cormac McCarthy's novel The Road is a quest story in the same vein as The Odyssey, or The Wizard of Oz, or the Book of Exodus. The only difference is that, to a large extent, it's a journey towards death rather than new beginnings. After an unspecified planetary cataclysm, an unnamed man and his son must make the hazardous journey on foot across a wrecked America towards the ocean, all the while dodging the dregs of leftover humanity who would capture and enslave them - or worse. This adaptation done by John Hillcoat (The Proposition), which stars Viggo Mortensen as The Man and newcomer Kodi Smit-McPhee as The Boy, adds a tiny measure of hope to McCarthy's dark tale - it also omits the two most heinous, probably unfilmable scenes. Still, it's an uncommon kind of film about the apocalypse, positing that things much worse than trans-planetary earthquakes and floods exist in the human soul. Hour caught up with Mortensen on the phone from Los Angeles last week.
Hour I've been thinking about your filmography, especially the two films you recently made with David Cronenberg, and it seems to me that you've never played a character this sad.
Mortensen Yes, the reason I wanted to do this is because it's a good story and a great character who has a great dramatic situation and a journey, but also because I was afraid of it. I had never played a character who has some kind of emotional turbulence going on under the surface all the time that is largely based
on regret and nostalgia. He has a profound sadness that he has to carry with him and somehow come to terms with, and that was a challenge. Hour The other challenge must have been finding the right co-star.
Mortensen In the book, it's the boy who breaks your heart really in the end. Kodi had something special, some sort of melancholy and wisdom. He had this kind of an old man inside him, and it was beautiful. It was incredible what he did, I would never have really got to certain places without him. And, like me, he's a Habs fan.
Hour Which means that like you, he is accustomed to heartbreak and the futility of hope?
Mortensen Yeah. Though I think it would be great to see the Habs go all the way, and I refuse to think it's impossible. But yes, as far as The Road, in spite of everything there's some hope there, and because we don't shy away from the tough parts, you really earn the uplifting ending... My favourite line of the film happens to be in voiceover, where [my character] says that by the end, the boy has helped him accept his fate and accept the way things are and appreciate life. He says, "If I were God, I would make the world just so, and no different."
Hour I assume you're applying that maxim to your feelings about the end of the world, and not the Habs' postseason prospects.
By coincidence, The Road happens to be coming out the week after one of the biggest disaster movies of all time, Roland Emmerich's 2012, which plays on similar themes: parents confronting their children's futures, as well as personal bravery and compassion. Does The Road have certain privileges because it's set after the cataclysm has already happened?
Mortensen When you see end-of-the-world sort of scenarios in movies, usually it's a spectacular kind of thing. I've seen how audiences have reacted to The Road. They start talking about their families and the world in a way that's not just "Wow, wasn't that cool when half the city fell under the ocean?" - there's a lot more to it. And also, because it's not a special-effects movie in the sense that it was shot in real environments [in the United States], you can clearly see there are places in the world that already look that way, there are people living on the streets of every city as though the end of the world has already happened.
The Road
Opens Nov. 27
"The Road" is a bit rocky. That's not to say it's a bad movie - just dishearteningly dark, not unlike the previous Cormac McCarthy adaptation "No Country for Old Men". Still it isn't without it's merits - after all, Viggo Mortensten's in it and he perfectly embodies the role of the nameless Father who strives to protect his Son. Every note he strikes is pitch perfect and the physical transformation that he's undergone for the role is also quite astounding. And then there's the performance of .., as the Son which offers up a ray of light, hope and optimism in an otherwise staggeringly disconsolate post-apocalyptic world. Also worthy of mention are some wee cameos by the likes of Robert Duvall, Guy Pearce and Molly Parker and Charlize Theron in flashbacks as the Mother - truly a soul-searing performance that will not leave you unmoved.
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Mark St Pierre
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Is it just me or is Viggo Mortensten becoming an actor in the mould of, say, Denzel Washington. The type of dude who picks projects of impeccable quality and then proceeds to deliver a bravura performance - this used to be Denzel's way and I, dare say, Viggo has picked up the mantle. Anyway, having said that, Viggo is sublime in "The Road", arguably one of the darker movies I've seen in quite some time. I mean the whole flick has an aura of such incredibly blighted starkness - desolation and despair are central themes and the palette of the barren landscape never strays far from a variety of depressing mottled grays. And yet in this post-apocalyptic wasteland there remains a faint glimmer of hope present in the spirit of the likes of Viggo who wills himself to persevere for his son. At times difficult to watch in it's graphic depiction of desperation (spoiler alert : yes, cannibalism does rear it's ugly head), it's ultimately a guardedly optimistic, if understated, film.
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David St Pierre
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