Road to Perdition

Road to Perdition (2002) is adapted from a graphic novel, and that graphic novel drew on a Japanese manga: Lone Wolf and Cub, the killer who walks with his son beside him. The Depression. Michael Sullivan works as an enforcer for the mob and his son does not know what his father does. One night the boy hides and watches. From that moment both of them have to run, and the film becomes a father and son road story. Its real subject is two father and son relationships. John Rooney, who raised Sullivan, has a son of his own, and Rooney openly prefers Sullivan. The entire feud comes out of that. Everybody was surprised when Tom Hanks took the part; until then he had always played the man you liked. He has not one warm scene here and that is deliberate. It was Paul Newman's last cinema role. The most discussed name attached to it is the cinematographer, Conrad Hall. In the assassination in the rain there is no sound of gunfire, only rain. Hall died shortly after the film's release and his Oscar was awarded posthumously. It runs 117 minutes. Good for: mob films, period drama, and visually driven cinema. Less good for: there is violence with a child at the centre of it. The pace is slow and there is little action.