Road picture. PG-13. 1 hour, 55 minutes. At area theaters.
Emilio Estevez wrote, directed and took a supporting role in “The Way,” an easygoing road picture that plays right into his father, Martin Sheen’s wheelhouse.
The “road” in this case is the Camino de Santiago, the famed Catholic pilgrim’s path from France into Spain, crossing the Pyrenees and ending at the cathedral in Santiago de Compostela.
Estevez has plopped his dad on this epic hike in a story of a father taking one last shot at getting to know his son and making a test of his own physical condition and faith.
Sheen plays Tom, a successful, widowed eye doctor who hasn’t seen much of his grad-student-turned- mystic-traveler son, Daniel (Estevez). Daniel dies early on in the pilgrimage, and Tom has the unhappy task of going to France to collect his body.
That’s where the flashbacks start, as Tom sees visions of Daniel and remembers their conversations. “Don’t judge this,” the son pleads, about his traveling. “Don’t judge me.”
And France is where Tom starts to meet the interesting people connected with this road. He decides, on a whim, to take Daniel’s backpack and make the journey for him, scattering his ashes at various gorgeous spots he passes.
“It will take over two months,” a fellow traveler warns.
“Then I’d better get started,” Tom replies.
This movie’s ambitions are small and its characters archetypes, for the most part, like modern versions of the people in “Canterbury Tales” or the travelers in “The Wizard of Oz,” which Estevez has called an inspiration for the film.
The deep thoughts expressed here play like Irish toasts or Dr. Phil aphorisms: “You don’t choose your life, Dad,” Daniel lectured his dad. “You live one.”
It makes for a warm, engaging blend of charm and travelogue, a plucky film that covers a lot of ground.
