...is what this movie wants us to believe. It strides off boldly in that direction without a second's reflection of its basic, flawed assumption that people are feral, rapacious, murderous and greedier than the worst animals are. Opening scenes show us women who willingly collude with misogynistic highway robbers, men killing each other for water and a supposed bible basher slaughtering a dozen people at a time. The 'hero' doesn't intervene when someone else's neck is on the line, though - for example, when a couple is being beaten and raped - oh no, fulfilling his quest is more important! Presumably, the additional message here is that preserving the alleged word of God is more important than the lives of innocent men and women, who are mere pawns in the quest to ensure 'something greater' survives. What could be greater than the human mind that creates these stories? Isn't destroying people to preserve a stupid book what countless inquisitors and jihadis believe to be right? How is putting a book above human lives meant to make the world a better place, when it apparently led to the near-annihilation of the human race just 30 years earlier? None of these questions are addressed or even asked. Many of the other assumptions that are made in this film are so gross, it seems like they must have come from someone who was raised with no other education aside from the bible. People never thought of sitting down and sharing food before the bible was written? Seriously?? Ancient artefacts from Egypt, Turkey, Greece, Meso America and all across the planet would beg to differ. Even monkeys and gorillas share their food, for crying out loud (even dogs do). Countless other civilizations have managed to survive huge calamities and upheavals and survive, without a bible. The directors ought to crack open a real history book sometime. They may be pleasantly surprised what they find there. I've personally also seen better use of this sort of black n white scenery in other graphic novel adaptations, like for instance, Sin City.

I have watched this movie six times and found it to get better with age. It's one of the few movies in my long life, which every actor, regardless of their status, turned in a good performance. The plot is simple, a man is on a mission and people are trying to stop him. It, as it should, allows the viewer to determine the effectiveness of it all and walk away with their own opinion, which can never be wrong!

May contain spoilers...I don't know how to rate this film...Why couldn't he have saved the Constitution, Fear and loathing in Las Vegas, Naked Lunch, The Outsiders, no the one book that gives us hope...because it leaves the imagination with little else... Now if he got to the end and read it and was like "Hell Naw" "Some one played the Li for a damn blind fool." and then he slashed it and the table in half and it said: To Be Continued, like the matrix... it would have been interesting at least.

To me it was just another action movie if the story about the book was not involved. However the action looks great in a apocalypse and western scene. I think the story about the book makes it a great movie in combination with all the action. Its a great movie to watch on a rainy Sunday afternoon.