Benjamin Rubenstein’s review published on Letterboxd:
I guess like any story that delves into the depth of humanity, "The Road" is bittersweet, including elements of both love and death. This is dark, tense, touching, and literally hard to see because the tone of the movie fits with what I imagine a post-nuclear world actually would look like.
Coincidentally, I've been reading "Ishmael," a philosophical novel that provides me new ways to look at the role of humans in the universe. The book suggests we're breaking the laws of the universe by taking whatever we want and destroying other species because we have no use for them. With that book in mind, while watching this I wondered if this scenario is inevitable--that it's inevitable that humans complete the path we're on and fully destroy the world. In that scenario, and in the scenario depicted in this movie, the few surviving people would return to the state humans were meant to be in, which is to say just like other animals fighting for territory and food and living in or near a state of "fight or flight."
Of course, then, it's inevitable that the remaining humans would regain civilization and return to taking whatever they want. If all that were to happen, then humans really are just in a cycle of destruction and replenishment, sort of like the universe itself if you believe the theory that "the big bang" triggered an expansion, and at some point there will be a universal contraction back to nothingness, followed by another "big bang," and on and on.
Regardless, I think this movie's touching moments with the innocent boy are most memorable. His traits are the ones we'd hope remain in future generations...post-apocalypse or not.