In spite of its rather depressing subject matter and its bleak outlook on most of humanity, The Road manages to be an insightful, relevant, entertaining and important film which will not only hook you from the opening moments but will cause you to do something that most movies released these days do not: Think. Based on the Cormac McCarthy best selling and Pulitzer Prize winning novel, adapted by Joe Penhall and directed by John Hillcoat, the film follows the journey of a father and son making their way to supposed safety in “The South” after an unknown disaster destroys most of humanity and reduces the world to snow and ash covered ruin.

Along the way the father and son encounter the worst of society reduced to ruin and come to realize that they may never reach safety and that that safety may, in fact, not even exist. The dynamic between the father and son is meticulously explored with both Viggo Moretnsen and relative newcomer Kodi Smit-McPhee giving standout performances. Mortensen is brilliant and physically transformed to inhabit his role and Smit-McPee takes what could have been a two dimensional role and infuses it with depth and courage well beyond his years. Looking at him as he progresses and his character evolves before your eyes, you experience what this journey must be like for him and how his relationship with his father changes during the course of it.

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We got quite a bit of different stuff sent to us here at The Flickcast. Some of it is pretty cool like trailers for upcoming movies, game videos, comics previews and things of that nature. We also get a lot of movie poster art sent to us and some of it is also pretty cool. Case in point are the two new “official’ posters for The Road and Youth in Revolt.

Both poster feature what so many do these days, large pictures of the principal actors and a clever or meaningful tag line. Also, both are different than previous posters that have been released for these films. In addition, on the poster for The Road, Mortensen is clearly holding a gun so you don’t think this is just a movie about people talking and, curiously, the names of the writer and director appear again in larger print at the bottom of the poster so they are clearly visible. This is, of course, an obvious attempt to make sure that people know who they are — particularly those who nominated and vote on the Oscars.

The Youth in Revolt Poster, at least to me, reminds me of the poster for Stanley Kubrick’s film Lolita, which I’ve included after the jump for comparison. I’m not sure what the marketing department at Dimension/Weinstein was trying to go for, but obviously some of them are Kubrick fans.

We’ve talked about these two films here before and you can expect a review of each of these films closer to their release dates. Until then, be sure to check out the larger versions of both posters after the jump. The Road opens on November 25th and Youth In Revolt opens on January 8th, 2010.

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