Play Along in the ‘Road’ Release-Date Sweepstakes!

Word has it that the Cormac McCarthy adaptation The Road is soon to land on the Weinstein Company shelf, thus vanquishing 1/3 of Viggo Mortensen’s 2008 Oscar dream and reviving rumours of TWC’s solvency a mere day after Harvey flaked out on a Midtown crowd that couldn’t wait to hear his plans for pulling a 2009 release slate out of his hat. At the least, the post-apocalyptic drama — once expected by Nov. 14 — was moved back to December shortly after the Weinsteins reclaimed the distribution duties from MGM, it still faces hassles with the Scott Rudin-less The Reader, and one blogger writes today of his test screening of a film isn’t even close to finished (spoilers follow):

So… work in progress. Fine tuning can help anything: Trim this scene, delete that redundant one. But I worry. They passed out those infamous test-screen questionnaires and delicate art fare like this… Well, won’t it just get stupid missing-the-point notes like “TOO DEPRESSING!”? Or “but why was there an apocalypse???” I hope they incinerate clueless scribbles and concentrate on constructive ones.

The movie is very faithful to McCarthy’s novel in current shape. It has mostly the same story beats as The Man and the Boy travel south trying to avoid starvation, cannibals, and unforgiving weather. The Road wisely avoids narration (the novel is minimalist and voice-over would conjure the opposite feeling altogether) and the production design from the Children of Men team is believably ashen and lived-in: They’ve cornered the market on post-apocalyptic drama! The Man (Viggo Mortensen) and The Boy (Kodi Smit-McPhee) have super chemistry which is a huge relief since everything potent about the story requires it. All of the nomadic starving ensemble have tiny roles but Robert Duvall floored me and Garret Dillahunt (rapidly turning into one of my favourite character actors) spooked me, respectively.

Great! So what do you say? Spring… 2010? Consider the Road Release Date Pool underway!

• ‘Road’ may not be done in time for ‘08 [THR]

• The Road is Under Construction [The Film Experience Blog]