Como Eli poderia fazer todas essas coisas?

IMDb lista algumas dicas que ele era cego, mas sua FAQ resume:

... the possibilities are:

• Eli is blind and if so, he either trained himself to be able to travel, hunt, shoot, etc. like a sighted person would or

  • perhaps God is guiding his every move, as Eli says "I know I wouldn't have made it this far without help."

• Eli is partially blind

• he is fully sighted and anything to suggest otherwise is just coincidence

Denzel Washington tinha isto para dizer :

The audience doesn’t get to know a lot about Eli’s past. How did he get skills like martial arts?

• In [Eli's] 30 years of walking, you run into people. I make light of it, but that’s almost the way I looked at it.

  … There’s this whole issue, without giving it away, is he blind, is he not.

  … If you look at the movie, sometimes I actually bumped into stuff — and they used it. But it was actually an accident or it was God’s will. In a couple of scenes, I bumped and tripped over stuff and they kept it in there.

  I’m sure there will be people [who say], “Oh, there’s the clue. … I told you he was [blind] because he bumped into that.”

  So maybe he can [see], maybe he can’t? Maybe he can see a little bit? Maybe his eyes are clouded? I don’t know.
  
  

So martial art skills don’t necessarily come with God’s calling?

• It could be a gifting.

Então, aparentemente, Eli entrando em contato com coisas não foi roteirizado, mas simplesmente Denzel sendo desajeitado.

Evidências Eli é cego veio a mim quando assistia ao filme pela segunda vez. Há um ponto em que Eli entra em uma antiga casa / barraca onde está procurando por comida (ou o que quer que ele possa encontrar). Ele está sozinho. Ele entra em uma sala separada no barraco onde o ocupante anterior se enforcou. Nós, como público, reconhecemos que há uma pessoa pendurada ali, mas Eli não. Ele reconhece, no entanto, o cheiro, mas não exatamente de onde vem o cheiro. Isso me leva a acreditar que Eli é cego.