The Book of Eli continues Hollywood's obsession with post-apocalyptic tales, and in many ways feels like it belongs in the same world as The Road with its ash-laden wastelands and crazed cannibals roaming about. But the comparisons end there. Where The Road is a thoughtful art film based on a Pulitzer prize-winning novel, Eli is more of a popcorn action flick influenced by the visual style of graphic novels, although it's more thought-provoking and less of an adrenaline rush than the Mad Max movies.

Denzel Washington stars as Eli, a lone traveler wandering America's wastelands presumably devastated by nuclear war 30 years prior. The stark landscape is littered with abandoned cars, crumbling buildings, bombed highways, and the occasional picked-clean body. Water and food are scarce, purchased through trade of whatever you happen to be carrying—wet wipes are humorously and understandably one of the hot commodities.