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Having read Cormac McCarthy's book, The Road, and not having committed suicide immediately afterwards in a major depressive state of despair and hopelessness, I decided to take another shot at it by watching the movie adaption. And it didn't hurt that it starred Viggio Mortenson. He was one of those actors who I had seen in movies but never really knew or recognized until he was in Lord of the Rings. Suddenly it was like - VIGGIO! He was in lots of familiar flicks. Most of them I liked. So when I saw The Road listed on Netflix, I went ahead and put it in my DVD queue.
Having read Cormac McCarthy's book, The Road, and not having committed suicide immediately afterwards in a major depressive state of despair and hopelessness, I decided to take another shot at it by watching the movie adaption. And it didn't hurt that it starred Viggio Mortenson. He was one of those actors who I had seen in movies but never really knew or recognized until he was in Lord of the Rings. Suddenly it was like - VIGGIO! He was in lots of familiar flicks. Most of them I liked. So when I saw The Road listed on Netflix, I went ahead and put it in my DVD queue. The movie is almost as depressing as the book. But I like the dark side. Due to my nature, I sometimes actually seek it out. Gailyn does not, so I watched alone. I was amazed at how many stars that I recognized in the movie. Not that the cast is that big, but I could name most of them. Did The Road get much buzz when it opened? I don't remember the opening. The book won a Pulitzer, but that doesn't always translate well to the screen, nor to big audiences.
I recognized something else. Some of the scenes looked eerily familiar. In fact, they were quite Erie-y. Evidently the final scenes were all shot in Erie. I did a archive search of our local paper. An Erie Times article reported that "shooting locations at Presque Isle State Park include Beach 10 and surrounding areas; Old Lake Road, which is near the park's entrance; and West Fisher Road, ...The crew also will shoot briefly at the nearby Tom Ridge Environmental Center and at a boat ramp in Lawrence Park."There's an article in the 27 May, 2008, New York Times about the filming of the movie. It says in part:
The producers chose Pennsylvania, one of them, Nick Wechsler, explained, because it’s one of the many states that give tax breaks and rebates to film companies and, not incidentally, because it offered such a pleasing array of post-apocalyptic scenery: deserted coalfields, run-down parts of Pittsburgh, windswept dunes. Chris Kennedy, the production designer, even discovered a burned-down amusement park in Lake Conneaut and an eight-mile stretch of abandoned freeway, complete with tunnel, ideal for filming the scene where the father and son who are the story’s main characters are stalked by a cannibalistic gang traveling by truck. (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/27/movies/27road.html)
The producers chose Pennsylvania, one of them, Nick Wechsler, explained, because it’s one of the many states that give tax breaks and rebates to film companies and, not incidentally, because it offered such a pleasing array of post-apocalyptic scenery: deserted coalfields, run-down parts of Pittsburgh, windswept dunes. Chris Kennedy, the production designer, even discovered a burned-down amusement park in Lake Conneaut and an eight-mile stretch of abandoned freeway, complete with tunnel, ideal for filming the scene where the father and son who are the story’s main characters are stalked by a cannibalistic gang traveling by truck. (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/27/movies/27road.html)
A reader commented on the story:
FYI, a lot of scenes were filmed along the abandoned Pennsylvania Turnpike. It's a 13-mile stretch of abandoned 4-lane superhighway near Breezewood, PA that's been sitting unused since the mid-1960s. The tunnel you see in one of the pictures is the eastern entrance to the Rays Hill tunnel. It's all open to the public.
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