"The Way" is one of the most beautiful movies I have ever seen and largely from the interplay between just four actors but also from the extraordinary view of walking on The Way of Saint James. There may be other Christian pilgrimages but this one is well-known and pilgrims have been walking its many paths for well over a thousand years.
WIKI: Camino de Santiago
The map shows the many ways one can walk the Camino with all culminating in Santiago de Compostela (WIKI).
Martin Sheen plays a taciturn, bad-tempered optometrist and it's understandable since he had come to Spain because his son had recently died trying to take the Walk. His purpose had been to bring his son's body home. Instead, Sheen decided he would fulfill his son's dream by spreading his ashes along the way. During the course of the Walk he is advised this isn't about religion.
He travels in the company of three others and relationships between them are at first icy but their attitudes to each other and a great many things evolve through the course of the walk. The evolution of those relationships is beautiful and that story is interspersed with fantastically beautiful views of different parts of the way and the people they meet while they walk along it.
The subject of taking this walk has come up previously and it's not for any religious purpose but rather to find people anywhere who are united toward anything good whatsoever. Whether this is a metaphor for Ithaka or the other way around really doesn't make much difference to me since it comes out the same. Give everything you have got so when you get there, not a thing is left of you. That's not the theme of the Way of Saint James but it is for Constantine Cavafy, the poet from whom the theme of the blog is derived.
Doing this is likely highly infeasible for any number of reasons but it still does no harm to contemplate it.
WIKI: Camino de Santiago
The map shows the many ways one can walk the Camino with all culminating in Santiago de Compostela (WIKI).
Martin Sheen plays a taciturn, bad-tempered optometrist and it's understandable since he had come to Spain because his son had recently died trying to take the Walk. His purpose had been to bring his son's body home. Instead, Sheen decided he would fulfill his son's dream by spreading his ashes along the way. During the course of the Walk he is advised this isn't about religion.
He travels in the company of three others and relationships between them are at first icy but their attitudes to each other and a great many things evolve through the course of the walk. The evolution of those relationships is beautiful and that story is interspersed with fantastically beautiful views of different parts of the way and the people they meet while they walk along it.
The subject of taking this walk has come up previously and it's not for any religious purpose but rather to find people anywhere who are united toward anything good whatsoever. Whether this is a metaphor for Ithaka or the other way around really doesn't make much difference to me since it comes out the same. Give everything you have got so when you get there, not a thing is left of you. That's not the theme of the Way of Saint James but it is for Constantine Cavafy, the poet from whom the theme of the blog is derived.
Doing this is likely highly infeasible for any number of reasons but it still does no harm to contemplate it.
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