'The Sunset Limited': Is Tommy Lee Jones' HBO film the greatest Cormac McCarthy adaptation?

Did anyone notice that the newspaper article Jackson reads is about the accident, which happened that same day? How did they just get to “the room”, have the written newspaper article, and have it be the same day? It occurred to me that the “death” actually took place, and “the room” is really just the opportunity given to us randomly, through grace, to have the argument put before us — “Can you let go of letting go?” White said he could not! And that was seemingly the seed of his attachment to his atheism. He argued his way out of the room; his clutch firm on his disillusionment. Can’t give it up and just walk forward through the “dangling in that howling void”. Faith and hope vs ennui ? Me thinks not! Him way attached! More babble later…

so what is the main underlying premise of the movie? that living is a better option than suicide? or that having faith is better than not having faith? or that compassion and empathy is a good sounding board for society to bang its drum of hope? could it be that the message has nothing to do with god? that holding on to pain serves only the self righteous who seem compelled to exticate a tormented soul by applying their own values as a means to give credence to their faith? or that an intellectual can be bullied into submitting to an ignorant theist by sculpting a message of “it’s what god wants” as his parting gift? Personally i’d be more convinced of the plot if TLJ stood by his convictions and argued SLJ into becoming sceptical of his so called faith. that way the reality of both issues could have ground the paste into a finer coat of paint. there is no question that these are fine craftsmen of their trade. but i’d have written an ending where TLJ is somehow enlightened by an epiphany while SLJ is broken on the wheel of TLJ’es intellect and made to see the emptiness of life’s existence only to dive off the train platform himself. now THAT would have demonstrated the inverted duality of the human condition in its true form. having said all this, i found the movie very stimulating and would have gladly foregone any mindless big budget action block buster to see it.