Sumith Prasad
Netflix’s disaster movie ‘Leave the World Behind’ is set in the town of Point Comfort in Long Island. The Sandfords rent out the Scotts’ house for a minivacation, only to deal with an impending apocalypse out of nowhere. Point Comfort is presented as one of the perfect getaway destinations for New York City folks. After arriving in the place, Amanda and Clay immerse themselves in the calmness of the region without realizing that their lives are going to be turned around in no time. The fates of the Sandfords and Scotts depend on them being in the place, which is similar to a real Long Island hermit!
The Real-Life Connections of the Fictional Town
Point Comfort is a fictional Long Island town conceived by Rumaan Alam for his novel ‘Leave the World Behind,’ the source text of the apocalyptic thriller. The author created the hermit after staying in a rented house on Long Island for a week. He was inspired by the locale to conceive the novel as well. “This particular book began with setting, more than people. The house that appears in this book is based quite specifically on a house my own family had stayed at on vacation in 2017 in the sort of like uncool — not uncool, but a part of Long Island,” Alam told Rolling Stone.
The house and the region occupied Alam’s mind, eventually convincing him to write about the fictionalized versions of the same. “I have a very good memory for spaces and places and I remember that house with a real specificity. I knew I wanted to write about that place. And I knew that I wanted to write a book that was what we call ‘domestic,’” the author added in the same interview. Alam, however, hasn’t revealed the exact location where he stayed. He must have integrated the calmness of the place into Point Comfort to make the fictional town a vacation destination.
The significance of the town lies in its name. Point Comfort is where the Sandfords and Scotts can find some “comfort” even when the apocalypse unfolds in the rest of the United States. Without confronting their immediate deaths, the members of the two families are able to think about ways to survive the disaster that affects the country because they are far removed from the wraths of the same in the town. As the film ends with Amanda and Ruth viewing a series of explosions destroying a part of New York City, they realize that they are alive only because they are in Point Comfort.
‘Leave the World Behind’ succeeds in terrorizing the viewers by hiding the real horror of the national emergency. To put a veil on the same, it is important to set the book and film in a place away from New York City, one of the most significant regions in the country. Therefore, the hermit has a pivotal place in the narrative of the apocalyptic thriller.
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