Straight Story
The road in which Alvin Straight travels is different from any other because he traveling from, through, and to a rural area. I feel that this gives the road a sense of purity and innocence to it. It is not busy, congestied, or confusing like the highway roads surrounding big urban developments. He is able to just relax and travel at 5 mph on his lawnmower and no one bothers to say no. He is able to sit alone and watch the sky and gather his thoughts and this I think helps him to gain the power to see his brother again and I feel he also gians a sense of hope and pride in himself. Hope that his brother will want to see him and feel the same shame and sadness as he does and pride because he is tackling this on his own. He is doing it his way and he conpletes his goal eventhough numerous people tried to help him. I think another great thing about this film was that each person he talked with not only did they in some way help him along on his journey, but he too taught them a life lesson. For example, with the first gril who was running away because she was pregnant he taught her the goodness of family and how a family must stick together through thick and thin. By telling her about the twigs he realized how hypocritical he was being by telling this to his own children when he was not even staying in contact with his brother for some stupid argument that happened years ago. Overall, I think that the rural road works as a means of reveltation, realization, and actualization because of its purity and because it is not so cluttered by human life and urban development. It may take longer but it is much simplier.