Early in the movie, The Book of Eli, the camera follows a lone man walking through a desolate landscape. His stride is measured, steady, deliberate. The steps are those of a man who walks with a purpose, who has somewhere to go, who also knows the journey is long and nowhere near its end. Before ever speaking a word, Denzel Washington, as the title character, reveals a great deal about the man he plays simply by the way he walks.
   Watching the scene, I remembered something I read about Sir Alec Guinness, the great British actor. Guinness said he never felt he had "gotten" a character until he knew how that person walked. Once he had the walk right, the rest of the portrayal fell into place. 
   A litany in the prayer book Jan and I use for Morning Prayer has a repeated line, "Make known to me the path that I must walk."
   In the movie, whenever Eli is asked where he is headed, he answers simply, "West." I first thought he was hiding his plans from a hostile world. Later, Eli tells another character that he himself knows little more. He says he is responding to a call, a voice he heard inside, and he is following that call. She tells him this is crazy. Eli believes the call is divine, and he keeps walking.
   "Make known to me the path that I must walk."
   Although the film is set in the future, Eli is in many ways the archetypal hero of the Hollywood western - the quiet stranger who never starts a fight but who always emerges victorious when attacked. Numerous villains in the film pay a high price for underestimating Eli.
   I think they should have known better. They should have paid attention to the way Eli walked.
   More important, you and I should pay attention to the way we we walk on God's earth.