Revolutionary Road a Revolutionary Experience: This film has become another in my own personal favorites. If a film makes it to my personal hit parade it means that it is, in my opinion, of intrinsic depth and phenomenal quality. It is so, I believe, in its content and in its acting. Both are superb! Kate Winslet's performance is simply riveting as is the performance of Leonardo DiCaprio. I was enthralled from the first moment the film began to its end.

There is so much in this movie to discuss and I will try to do so limiting and without revealing any crucial information. I could relate to Winslet's character who simply could not, within that time period, fulfill her desire to be something extraordinary. I could relate to DiCaprio's character, too, who wants success, sees the futility of a boring occupation and life but cannot quite allow himself to dare take the plunge into more exciting but unknown waters.

Their marital relationship is torturous because neither can give to the other what each so desperately needs and wants. It is a tumultuous and explosive relationship to say the least as each tries with futility to fill the void in the other's life and be what the other wants. Neither can deliver that. As Ratso Rizzo says in “Midnight Cowboy” there are "gaps" in life. The question here, I think, is can another human being fill those gaps or are we all responsible ultimately for our own satisfaction? What role, too, does society play in allowing us the freedom of movement to fill those gaps and live our happiness?

Too often, I think, one looks to another for the way to ultimate satisfaction only to be disappointed as one human being simply cannot do that entirely for another. The era of the 1950's and early 1960's with its rigid sex roles and unnecessary rules placed women and men too in the difficult position of looking to their mate to satisfy the emptiness in each other's lives within a stricture that does not allow for movement. If one’s happiness is not the other’s what does one do in a culture such as that? Truly, it is an impossible task for both characters to attempt. They are two different people trying to live a singular relationship that a marriage of that era demanded. Irrespective of when they first met, their relationship seemed wrong from its start. They were, however, trapped by the conventions of marriage and of the time in which they lived.

The antiseptic yet underlying combustible aspect of the 1950's is evident. It is somewhat reminiscent of the series “Mad Men” when during this ever-so-conventional time human beings submerge their feelings for the appearances of propriety. In that era one simply did not talk usually about uncomfortable psychic issues unless and until those feelings became a Vesuvian eruption seeking outlet somewhere and even then their depth was either misdirected or avoided entirely.

Without giving away the difficult end of the film it made me ever grateful I live in an era which enjoys the benefits of the revolutionary road of the late 1960s. It truly made me appreciate how necessary those changes were as we all strive for our own pursuit of happiness and because of that time have a bit more flexibility within which to move.

This film left me breathless and I fear my opinion above does not do all of it justice. Kudos to two other characters: Kathy Bates gives her usual excellent performance as the 1950’s prototype of a seemingly superficial woman selling real estate within very complex familial issues underneath the surface. Kudos also to Michael Shannon as Kathy Bates’s emotionally disturbed but very savvy adult son. It takes his pathological character to throw into view the depth and pathology of the Wheelers' feelings about themselves and each other. His character was a revolutionary road which threw open the window into the Wheelers’ soul and ignited the appropriate and only end which the film could have had.

This was a marvelous viewing experience.