Comparing The Road And Place Beyond The Pines

A motif is a reoccurring theme that is revisited throughout the text multiple times. There are three themes that are addressed various times in both ‘The Road’ and in ‘Place Beyond the Pines’; they are sacrifice, loss and hope. Each of these themes has a high significance and influence in the films plat and way in which the characters interact. The protagonists in both texts, the Father and Son in ‘The Road’ and Luke and Jason in ‘Place Beyond the Pines’, display all three motifs at strategic points as the story continues.

Sacrifice is shown in ‘The Road’ when continuously throughout the film the Father sacrifices his health, well-being and safety so that his Son is warm, fed, hydrated and safe in the post-apocalyptic world they are trekking through. The mysterious Mother in ‘The Road’ makes no sacrifice, but assumes her husband will, she kills herself, leaving the job of killing their son to the Father without even questioning if he would carry out the assumed task. However this in contrast to the Father, who does not want to ‘save’ his son from this world, as the Mother did. He simply wants his Son to live to see a better world. He tries to give his son as many ‘treats’, as he can in their situation, from the old world, an old can of Coca Cola, a powdered drink mix. As the man lies dying, he tells his son to eat his share of food, instead of keeping it for himself in hopes of

Their fathers mould Jason and the Son both, knowingly or not. Their fathers are the mediums through which their hope and sense of loss are channelled, especially by the sacrifices the father and Luke make for their sons.

Both of these texts show these themes continuously throughout the films, making them motifs, which shape both the plot and the characters in comparison and contrast in their cognition and