The Way

When his estranged son dies in an accident on the Camino de Santiago (“Way of St. James,” a 500-mile pilgrimage path from France over the Pyrenees into Spain), an Los Angeles ophthalmologist (Martin Sheen) flies to France to bring the body home, but instead follows an impulse to make the pilgrimage himself, spreading his son’s ashes at key spots along the way. Written and directed by Sheen’s son Emilio Estevez (who plays the son in flashbacks), the movie tends to meander in spots and has a little trouble wrapping things up with a neat finish, but those quibbles fade in comparison with its virtues: fine ensemble acting by Sheen and the companions he meets on his trek (Deborah Kara Unger, Yorick van Wageningen, James Nesbitt), beautiful rugged scenery, and a pervasive air of disarming, unpretentious sincerity.