THE LOW ROAD SYNOPSIS
Student Ellie and her best friend Lewis study anthropology at a Glasgow University, and both harbour the secret of self-harm. Ellie is in therapy, but Lewis struggles alone. When Lewis takes his own life, Ellie’s world is ripped apart. Trying to navigate her pain, Ellie goes clubbing and ends up in bed with a classmate who then slut-shames her on social media. To try and make sense of what has happened, Ellie embarks on the journey that Lewis had dreamed of doing one day.
Unprepared and overwhelmed, Ellie sets out on the hike with the end goal of visiting Lewis’s bereaved mother on the remote Scottish Isle of Skye. Blaming herself for Lewis’s suicide, a guilt-ridden and broken Ellie wants to apologise to his mother.
Through the breath-taking wilderness of Scotland, Ellie stumbles into situations and people that challenge her to the core. She comes up against toxic masculinity in the form of a father and son and finds her voice as a woman, their wilderness experience creates a huge change of perspective for all. A chance encounter with a mother and daughter offers wisdom that helps her start to think differently about her past.
Arriving at Lewis’s family home hoping for forgiveness, Ellie breaks down in the arms of his mother. Lewis’s mother Oliva shares dark secrets of her sons past that help Ellie understand why he took his life. In their shared grief, they both discover that nobody is to blame for his death. The redemption at the end of Ellie’s pilgrimage transforms her. Before returning to Glasgow, Ellie, by a bonfire, has a cathartic release.
Coming home, she takes the vulnerable step of broadcasting live on social media her university presentation of ‘what it means to be a human being’. It goes viral, as she speaks for a generation dealing with high suicide rates and mental health challenges. Ellie’s brutally honest and brave exposé of the mental health crisis across the world sparks positive change and her new life begins.