Baker - The Road

The novel The Road depicts the journey of a father and his son as they try to survive in a post-apocalyptic America. The two characters struggle not only with their physical needs, such as hunger and bodily damage, but also their emotional trials as they witness the horrors of desperate means of surviving.

I think the main goal of the father in this story is to prepare his son to live a life after the father has passed away. He continually emphasizes that they are the "good people" and that they "carry the fire". For example, when the pair comes across a group of emaciated individuals trapped in a cellar waiting to be eaten alive, the boy is shown the true repulsion of what human beings are capable of doing in order to survive. I think the film put a bigger emphasis on this scene, more so than the novel, because the way this group of people resorted to cannibalism is so horrifying and shocking. Yes, they were trying to survive, but what the father is trying to show his son is that there are other ways to survive, and killing is not one of them. The boy asks his father if they would ever eat anyone, even if they were starving, and his father responds with, "we're starving now". He is telling his son that they are in the same situation as the other people, but they are choosing to be "good".

I think the boy's essential goodness is so clear throughout both the novel and the film, especially in his scenes involving the man who stole the cart and Ely. The boy is so unwilling to see them get hurt, and he even wants to give the men food so that they will not die.

The ending of the novel and the film were very similar in my opinion. The only difference that the film contained for me was seeing the family who was going to take the boy in, including the two children, one of which was a boy seen earlier in the novel/film. I think when the boy was deciding whether or not to join the family at the end, and he asks the man if he is "carrying the fire," this is showing that the boy will continue down the path that his father hoped he would. What I took away from this story was that the boy did find other "good" people left in the world, and I think that is significant because it provides a sense of hope.

Castellon: The Road (Book and Film)

The book and the movie generally depicted human nature as malevolent and desperate due to the lack of food and resources. In addition, the ending in the book was similar to the ending in the movie. Both, book and film, implied that a man and a woman traveling with their kids had been trailing the boy and his father. In the end, the boy decides to continue traveling with them after his father dies.

The book and the film described and depicted torture, slavery, and cannabalism. Although it is easy to judge such malicious behavior, it is also easy to understand considering an apocalypse just occurred and there was no food in sight. Very few people existed and to complicate matters they did not seem to be very well educated or skilled.

It was natural for humanity to revert to primitive behavior. For instance, the boy and his father came across a charred human infant headless and gutted in the woods. Notwithstanding, the confrontation between the father and the man who was traveling on a truck with other men looking for children or other live human beings to eat. The end result was the man's demise with a bullet in his forehead shot by the father.

Another instance depicted a confrontation between the boy's father and a man who had come across their cart filled with food and blankets on the beach. The man stole these items while the boy and his father were searching for more resources. When the boy and his father caught up to the man, he urged them not kill him and said, "you would have done the same thing." By saying this, he implied that all human beings were no longer civilized in nature.

The ending in the film did not change what I had imagined from the ending in the book because they were similar. As far as what may have happened to the boy, I think that the man and the woman had good reason to allow him to join them. I say this because the man stated, "there was a debate whether to leave or take you with us." In desperate times, I think they realized that the boy could be useful to them in providing additional security because he possessed a gun and assist in scavenging.

O'Keefe - Ladder 49

The question of whether Jack Morrison valued his career over his family is one with an answer rife with caveats. Jack may first appear as a standard and simple character but he is actually far more complex than he outwardly appears; he’s torn between his dedication to his job and his duty and his dedication to his family. This inner conflict, I believe, is the most important aspect of his character within the scope of the film. The film acts, more or less, to tell the story of Jack’s conflict. It begins with his first day on the job, whereupon we first see evidence of his unerring dedication to duty and to helping others and ends with his acceptance of his fate and, ultimately, with his demise.

We can see evidence of Jack’s uncertainty in the flashback in which Jack and Mike Kennedy are in the café. After the harsh reality of Tommy’s injury sets in we see Jack questioning the wisdom of such a dangerous career choice in light of his growing family. Jack even goes so far as to consider taking an aide job with Mike as opposed to fieldwork and broaches the subject with his wife, Linda. The fact that Jack would even take this into consideration after his dedication to his work had been so firmly established in previous scenes show just how deeply conflicted Jack is about the subject.

If one was to try and find a concrete answer to the question of whether Jack’s work or his family is more important to him the most logical place to look for evidence would be the last scenes prior to Jack’s memorial service. In this scene we find Jack, trapped in the burning building in which the entire movie is set (assuming that all of the scenes not pertaining to Jack’s final fire are flashbacks) and having just made it through the brick wall and one step nearer the rest of Ladder 49, faced with the realization that due to the wall of flame before him he will almost certainly die in this building. In this moment Jack accepts his fate and asks Mike to call off the fruitless rescue efforts in order to reduce the risk of further casualties. This would seemingly indicate that Jack had ultimately picked his duty to firefighting over his family. However, I think the most correct answer to this question is that regardless of his reflecting and reminiscing while awaiting the rescue that never would come, his decision was ultimately moot, as given the preceding events, he was ultimately going to perish in that building regardless of how he felt.

Henderson Saturday

In the novel Saturday by Ian McEwan, Henry Perowne, is a neurosurgeon and also the main character of the. He lives a very comfortable lifestyle and has a loving wife Rosalind and two adult children. He and his wife are very much in love.  He focuses much of his time on his work however. The setting is a Saturday in London, England in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks (2003).

One specific incident in the novel is when Henry sees the burning plane falling from the sky and automatically goes into terror attack defense mode. He begins to think about what the passengers must be going through. Like it I discussed in the review “A Day in the Life” by W.R. Greer the UK is an ally of the United States so it would make sense that their country might be the target of another terrorist attack. Henry develops so many feelings about insecurities and not feeling safe.  He is skeptical about his safety because of the vulnerability that the Unites States experienced during the 9/11 terror attacks. He lives in fear of

In another incident Henry gets into a minor car accident while trying to make it to a squash game with a fellow surgeon. On the route to the game there are protesters who are gathering in an anti-war effort. He is able to escape the man he got into an accident with, Baxter. He does this by diagnosing Baxter with Huntington’s disease. Even thought he was punched in the chest before. Greer writes, “It’s this random event that will haunt Perowne, eventually threatening everything he hold dear in his life.” In a way Baxter also infiltrates Henry’s sense of security like the 9/11 did. Because Baxter threatened Henry’s wife and degraded his daughter among other incidents Henry’s safety is again invaded. Henry loses his sense of security and like his country at the time awaits anticipated attacks. His future mindset relates exactly to these things and his lack of protection.

Baker - Saturday

In Ian McEwan’s novel Saturday, the main character Henry Perowne attempts to navigate the complexities of a world that he previously (before 9/11) thought was safe, and in his search for safety, he coincidently examines his own morality and inner confidence. Following the attack that occurred on 9/11, Perowne (although he is a very intelligent, successful British neurosurgeon with a beautiful, healthy, thriving family) spends his entire Saturday questioning his safety and the confidence he has in himself, and Zoe Heller puts it best: “in an instant, his illusion of intellectual mastery over his surroundings is shattered and the euphoric visions of civic cooperation are replaced by dreadful imaginings of panic and death” (Heller).

Perowne’s insecurities begin when he sees a burning, floundering fireball speeding down to earth. Immediately, he figures it to be a meteor of some sort. After ruling the meteor possibility out, he assumes that an accident occurred, and he wonders if he should try to help. Ultimately, he settles on the possibility that the “figure” is really an act of terrorism (much like the attack that happened in America on the twin towers). Quickly, an unsettling fear for his wellbeing grips him for over an hour. As the fear for his safety finally dies down when he learns that the “terrorist plane” is in fact a harmless cargo plane, a new emotion of anger emerges – not at the possibility of terrorist acts but at the idea that he so quickly abandoned his self-assured logic and reason that he has relied on (and thrived on) for his entire life. Consumed by distaste for his own fickle minded hysterics, Perowne begins to question his confidence.

Perowne correlates religious faith to “what his psychiatric colleagues call a problem, or an idea, of reference. An excess of the subjective, the ordering of the world in line with your needs, an inability to contemplate your own unimportance'' (McEwan). Clearly, Perowne is not a religious man, which can lead to a lack of moral fiber – an issue that flares up when he gets into a car crash with Baxter. Baxter is a thug who attempts to intimidate Perowne into taking ownership as the cause of the accident. As Baxter is intimidating him, Perowne uses his intellect to defeat his foe by calling him out on his Huntington’s disease. The tactic works, but Perowne feels extreme guilt after the altercation, as explained by Zoe Heller: “by confronting him with this diagnosis, he creates a distraction that allows him to escape without injury. As he drives away, his relief is undercut by misgivings. He doubts the morality of using his medical authority as a stun gun, even in an act of self-defense” (Heller). Perhaps his lack of religion has led to a lack of moral values; hence, his intuitive humiliation and belittlement of Baxter.

Vitanza - Saturday

The novel Saturday is a very interesting story, about a successful neurosurgeon and his view of life after 9/11. The way the novel portrays the story of this doctor, Henry Perowne, keeps the reader entertained and thirsty to figure out the outcome of that Saturday.

The love Henry has for his family is a force that drives him to worry about the lack of safety in present times. Rosalind plays the biggest part in Henry’s life. Rosalind is that person Henry goes to when he feels threatened or insecure. After the car crash, with Baxter, Henry becomes vulnerable and the only person that can get him to feel better is Rosalind, so he calls her. “On this important day for her (Rosalind) he doesn’t want intend to distract her with the story of his near thrashing. And he doesn’t need sympathy. What he wants is more fundamental, the sound of her voice …” (100).

Through this fragment we can figure out Rosalind’s role. Every time Henry manages to describe her; how they met, the relationship with her father and other experiences, he does so with the greatest pleasure and detail possibly imagined.

Henry cannot seem to make up his mind on whether the war to overthrow Saddam is a wise move or not. Once he meets Miri Taleb, a former patient, he describes Henry the horrible experiences of the time he was arrested, Henry then convinces himself that the war might not be such a bad idea.

This idea of war and possible terrorist attacks is what drives humanity mad. There is no such sense of safety anymore, and by nature we all seek safety. Britain and all of the United State’s allies are alert in case of a possible terrorist attack; hence the march, and the thorough investigation of the Heathrow plane crash in the novel. As Nan A. Talese explains in Saturday – A Day in The Life: “It’s the fear of terror that has overtaken the western world since 9/11, that thousands of happy lives, if not more, could be snuffed out in moments during the war.”

Personally, I enjoyed Theo’s theory about life he discusses with his father, Henry. Theo explains to his father, “But I think small, closer in – you know, a girl I’ve just met, snowboarding next month, then it (the World) looks great.” He does make an interesting point, and I don’t mean to completely forget about global events, but neither flood your mind with it.

Hubbard: Saturday

In Ian McEwan's novel "Saturday", I noticed several themes and events that takes place in Fitzrovia, London, where the story takes place. Th main character Henry Perowne, is a neurosurgeon that goes through a series of events all on the Saturday of February 15, 2003. By just analyzing Perowne who is a successful doctor and a great husband and father, you would think that his life is perfect and all together. However, it's evident that just because you're successful, can afford to live a comfortable lifestyle, and have a wonderful family, that doesn't mean that things are always going to be good and you'll always be happy. Things can change in a matter of a day and for the rest of your life you could have a different outlook on life. Perowne discovers this one Saturday that came with a series of violent events.

That Saturday morning, he notices an aeroplane shooting across the sky in flames. Keep in mind that the September 11th attacks was only two years ago and countries were on a verge of declaring war. Reporters didn't know whether it was terrorism or just an accident. Perowne was probably wondering if the country he calls home is even safe anymore. Why must there be such violence and turmoil in this world? This causes his day to start off not so good and puzzle him a little. Later he has a collision with another car while in route to a squash match and damages the car a little. The other driver Baxter and two associates of his gets out of the car furious and demands money from Perowne but he refuses. Perowne took a punch to the chest and then realizes the onset of Huntington's disease in Baxter. He uses that to distract him so he could flee the scene safely. After running a few errands and handling some family matters, he returns home.

His family members trickled in shortly after each other. The event that really makes his day worse was when Baxter invaded his home right after his wife Rosalind had returned. Baxter and an accomplice came in baring knives and begun to threaten Perowne's family. They assaulted his father-in-law and to make things even horrible, they forced his daughter Daisy to take off all of her clothes. Fortunately, Daisy recites a poem and gets Baxter to break down and is then over powered. This is way too much to deal with in one day. It took a big toll on Perowne to be assaulted over a minor collision and then return home to watch his family assaulted and threatened and then his daughter degraded. There was a time when homes were the place where you felt secure and comfortable. Now home wasn't the same anymore for Perowne and his family. On page three of Nan Talese review of the novel, she wrote about how we can't avoid the worries of the future. The novel proves that things are not always certain in life and one day can make a big difference out of your life.