Patron Pick – The Way

This special reward is available to Patreon patrons who pledge at the $10 or $20 monthly levels. Each month, those patrons will pick a film for me to review. If they choose, they also get to include some of their thoughts about the movie. This Pick comes from Bekah Lindstrom.

The Way (2010)
Written and directed by Emilio Estevez

I’m not someone who likes to just walk around. However, there are people in this world who find enjoyment in doing just that. This film is about a group of people hiking the Camino de Santiago, a network of pilgrimages leading to the shrine of James the Apostle in northwestern Spain. This film is inspired explicitly by Emilio Estevez’s son Taylor, who drove the route with his grandfather, Martin Sheen, in 2003. Taylor met the woman he would marry on this journey and seemed to have had a profound experience through the journey. At first, Estevez and Sheen thought a documentary might be the route, but then they decided to make a more expansive narrative feature.

Dr. Thomas Avery (Sheen) is an American ophthalmologist who is stunned to learn his estranged son Daniel (Estevez) has died. Daniel passed during a brutal storm in the Pyrenees while hiking the Camino. Thomas makes the flight to Spain to retrieve his son’s remains but decides to complete the hike while spreading Daniel’s ashes as he goes. Along the way, he meets other hikers, including Joost, a congenial Dutchman. Sarah (Deborah Kara Unger) is a Canadian woman who is dealing with PTSD from an abusive relationship. Jack is an Irish travel writer who is trying to work through his block. These four interact and go through various conflicts on the journey. By the end, this hike opened Tom’s mind to the desire to see more of the world, and he plans on another trip.

This was just not the film for me. From the start, I got a strong Pure Flix vibe from it. It’s not a film that proselytizes fundamentalist Christianity, but it did get the attention of Pat Robertson’s Christian Broadcasting Network, which initiated interviews and promoted it. The setting is interesting, so you’re always getting engaging landscape visuals. I also didn’t know about this trail, so the film informed me. I couldn’t help but feel the documentary idea might have been a better choice and probably would have kept me engaged better than the melodrama that we got.

I certainly wasn’t emotionally moved by this film because it is far too saccharine. Tom being given his son’s remains should be a more emotionally impactful moment, but I didn’t shed a single tear. That’s because the film’s emotion is not from a place of authenticity and maturity but from shallow formulas. Characters are painted as broadly as possible and defined by a couple quirks. I never saw them as anything other than roles played by actors, not fully realized people, which is what they needed to be.

If I had to switch out directors, I would have put someone like Kelly Reichardt in charge of this. In films like Wendy & Lucy or Other Women, she can present everyday people and their struggles with genuine emotional authenticity. She doesn’t rely on sentiment. Her films often lack a musical score to further center the audience in the characters’ reality. When I watch Reichardt’s movies, I feel her character’s internal struggles, and that’s because she is willing to let them be unlikeable or have bad things happen to them. Her endings aren’t particularly overflowing with enthusiastic joy, but they are honest and leave the audience with much to contemplate, which would have benefited this picture.

I don’t credit movies for being “sweet” or “nice” because those are easy to accomplish. You just ignore the harsh realities of life. You also make films of pretty much all white people to sell that idea, which is what this movie does. The picture also clocks in at two hours, much longer than this film deserves. The story just meanders because it never wants to wrestle with true complexity. The group hikes through this place and has an encounter. They hike through this place and have an argument. This repeats several times and never adds up to anything you couldn’t predict. There’s nothing that surprised me, and it’s pretty dull.

The best word to describe this movie is “cliche.” It’s one after the other, from the character to the plot to the soundtrack. I don’t doubt this meant a lot to Emilio Estevez, but it certainly reveals that he is not that talented of a writer-director. Let’s be honest. He made this movie because his dad is Martin Sheen, and Estevez has many connections in Hollywood. This was not made because he is a supremely talented filmmaker. It’s certainly forgettable, but it’s a topic worthy of a better filmmaker’s take on it.