At one point in The Road, a moment that is never otherwise explained or referenced, the father and the son stare at a dead forest as it burns. Nothing moves in the ravaged landscape save the ash on the wind and water. It is cold enough to crack stones, and, when the snow falls it is gray. The sky is dark.
Their destination is the warmer south, although they don't know what, if anything, awaits them there. They have nothing: just a pistol to defend themselves against the lawless cannibalistic bands that stalk the road, the clothes they are wearing, a rusting shopping cart of scavenged food and each other.
The Road is no tease. It is a brilliantly directed adaptation of a beloved , a delicate and anachronistically loving look at the immodest and brutish end of us all. You want them to get there, you want them to get there, you want them to get there and yet you do not want it, any of it, to end.