I've always been fascinated by questions of faith and spirituality and the idea is that there is something greater than yourselves. The idea of the movie was the belief in something greater than yourself, the most powerful force in the universe, and that's a force that can be turned either for good or evil depending on what we do with it. --Gary Whitta, Author of "Book of Eli"
Feb. 10,2010 (CarolynBaker.net) -- During the past year, Hollywood has brought forth an array of post-apocalyptic movies such as "2012" and "The Road," but "The Book of Eli" is unique in this genre by way of a message that supersedes a abject survivalism as the bottom line theme. The message was intentional for screenplay author, Gary Whitta, who comments that "faith and hope have as much value to humanity as sustenance and safety." In other words, "The Book of Eli" is about much more than first-chakra survival in a world where little else matters and where most people are fighting, moment to moment, to simply stay alive.
The story focuses on a man in the not-too-distant future who has become a warrior, not by choice but by necessity, 30 years after what is referred to as "the flash" and the subsequent war that left the earth a catastrophic wasteland. Few people are alive who remember what the world was like before those cataclysmic events, and the rest are illiterate with no sense of history or purpose beyond finding food, water, and shelter.
For three decades, Eli (Denzel Washington) has been walking and wandering in response to a voice that he says came from inside him to protect the book (a bible) that he found amid the rubble of cataclysm, and keep heading west. Along the way he witnesses myriad injustices and wrongs he could help right, but instead, he chooses to abide with his instructions and avoid such entanglements.
We wonder why a bible in such a world makes any difference, but we soon discover that the war may have erupted in part because of religion and the power and control some people usurped in its name. Almost all bibles were burned after the war, and we assume it was for this reason. One man besides Eli in the current intellectual wasteland understands the power of books and reading them, and especially the power of the bible as a tool of control. That man is Carnegie (Gary Oldman)-an ironic name given that the nineteenth-century steel tycoon, Andrew Carnegie, donated millions to the building and maintenance of libraries in the United States. After encountering Eli and learning that he has a bible, the Carnegie of Whitta's screenplay is relentless in his quest to obtain it and is willing to do whatever it takes to do so because he shamelessly declares that "if we have the book, we can control people". But from Eli's perspective, nothing and no one will stand in the way of fulfilling his mission and following the instructions to keep walking west.
Some reviewers have described the milieu of "The Book of Eli" as a "Mad Max" scenario, but it seems important to note that the latter movie was made in the 80s in the throes of Reagan's "morning in America" when consumerism on steroids and off-the-scale narcissism ruled. Thus, in those days, movie-goers could only find the world of Mad Max bizarre and purely mythical whereas today, as we find ourselves sinking deeper into the Second Great Depression, fraught with the ramifications of Peak Oil, climate change, and global economic devastation, that particular scenario feels increasingly more plausible.
In Eli's world of abject lawlessness, ruled by roving gangs and petty dictators like Carnegie, life is all about survival and the physical strength it takes to maintain it. What we consider today basic necessities of life, such as soap, toothpaste, and shampoo have disappeared, and most humans are creatures that can only be described as vile in their lack of hygiene as well as their lack of any moral compass.
For Eli, however, life is about so much more than food, water, and shelter, and that is precisely what makes his character and this particular movie unique. He is cherishing what seems to have eluded everyone else around him -- a profound spiritual connection. Forget that it's a bible he's carrying. Forget that his spirituality has a distinctly Christian flavor. As anyone who sees the movie is likely to agree, he could have been carrying the I Ching or the Bhagavad Gita or the Koran. Please dear reader/moviegoer, do not get ensnared here by whatever axes you have to grind with religion. The point is that it was Eli's connection with the sacred that sustained him emotionally in a world of madness and mayhem.
And yes, a world of cannibalism where people who eat human flesh develop uncontrollable, chronic trembling, particularly of the hands, and those whose hands do not tremble are proud to be "not one of them". It's a world of ghastly abuse of women-gang rape and sexual slavery. In fact, as I witnessed the treatment of women in this film, I reflected on complaints I've heard from many of my female friends about the portrayal of women in James Howard Kunstler's novel A World Made By Hand. And while I agree that the portrayal in that novel was grim, what I also believe is that it was probably understated in terms of how life for women in a post-collapse, savage world is likely to become.
As a result, Eli holds values unknown to those around him. He's kind and caring, but he's not a pacifist; he kills to defend his life and protect the innocent. He feels and expresses gratitude before meals for the food he is privileged to have and for the mentoring friendship he develops with a young woman who insists on walking alongside him as he continues his journey. Her insistence is driven by her admiration of him as well as the misery of her life in the town controlled by Carnegie. She is Solara (Mila Kunis), and she has no concept of life before "the flash" and "the war" -- a time when Eli says, "We had more than we ever needed, we didn't realize how precious it was, and we threw stuff away that people would kill for today." Sound familiar?
Eli further shows us how human he is as he cherishes a battered IPod he charges along the way from parts of an old car battery or wherever he can occasionally find electricity. Early in the movie he falls asleep to Al Green singing "How Can You Mend A Broken Heart?" In fact, the lyrics are quite ironic given Eli's situation:
And how can you mend a broken heart?
How can you stop the rain from falling down?
How can you stop the sun from shining?
What makes the world go round?
How can you mend this broken man?
How can a loser ever win?
Please help me mend my broken heart
I have stated repeatedly that I do not know how the collapse of industrial civilization will play out, and I have also stated in my book, Sacred Demise, and elsewhere, that without a profound spiritual connection-a solid sense of meaning and purpose for our existence, a collapsing, transitioning world will be untenable and unbearable. "The Book of Eli" portrays precisely why that is so. And like no other futuristic movie of our time, it depicts poignantly why and how the demise and its ensuing journey are sacred.
Curiously, this movie appears in our culture at the same time as James Cameron's latest blockbuster, "Avatar." Deeply embedded in many of Cameron's movies is a spiritual or archetypal theme, and "Avatar" is perhaps the most obvious example. Although it offers a much more pleasant viewing experience, it is profoundly connected with "The Book of Eli" on one level because if the lessons "Avatar" illustrates to the human race are not learned, the irrevocable result will be "The Book of Eli."
I could say much more about the movie depicting Gary Whitta's screenplay which I passionately urge you to see, but I really do not want to dilute its impact. While it is not all darkness and horror, it doesn't offer the traditional happy ending but rather one possibility of transition to a new paradigm of wisdom for our species. "The Book of Eli" reveals where we are headed, but more importantly, the difference one human being's relationship with something greater makes for himself and for future generations.