The film opens in ash-filled woods. A corpse lies rotting on the ground and a malnourished cat climbs over it and begins nibbling at its feet. An arrow shoots into the cat, killing it instantly. Eli (Denzel Washington) walks over to the cat, plucks out the arrow and bags it for dinner.
Eli walks through the abandoned road in a post-apocalyptic 2043. He is a wanderer and traveling out West. He finds an abandoned House and searches it for anything that can be useful. He tries to fill his canteen with water, but the sinks dont work. He checks a closet and finds a dead body. He takes the corpses boots and clears his weapons while listening to an ancient 1st Generation iPod. He roasts the cat and eats it, sharing a small portion with a mouse that runs by him.
The next morning, Eli wakes up and finds that his iPod is nearly out of power. The car battery rig he uses to charge it is almost out of juice. Eli continues his journey West and encounters a woman with a broken cart. She asks him for help, but Eli calls out to the marauders hiding nearby since he can smell them. The leader pushes Eli around, wanting to rob him, but Eli cuts off his hand with his machete. He then fights 5 marauders at the same time and kills them all. He then kills the leader, robs the corpses of their valuables and walks away, continuing his journey West.
As he continues his journey, his iPod runs out of juice. He continues on his journey and ends up at the end of a destroyed high way ramp. Below, a couple is attacked by a group of bikers. The bikers kill the man, rape the woman and steal all of their books. They drive off, leaving Eli shaken but resolute in his determination not to get involved. He ponders which direction to go in and then ends up walking into a town. He finds the Engineer (Tom Waits) and trades him some wet naps and a lighter for a recharge on his battery. While he waits, he asks if there is a place where he can fill his canteen. He crosses the street to the bar across the street.
The bikers who killed the couple arrive at the bar and deliver the books and items they stole from the couple to Carnegie (Gary Oldman), the mayor of the makeshift town. Carnegie is looking for a book, so he sends his illiterate henchmen to collect all the books they can. He sees the books they bring and is less than pleased. He orders that they be burned. He takes a bottle of shampoo and tells Redridge (Ray Stevenson), his right hand man, that the bikers are to be rewarded for such a discovery. He goes to his concubine, Claudia (Jennifer Beals), and shares the shampoo with her.
Downstairs, Eli trades his gloves and a blanket for a full canteen of water. The bar tender gives the canteen to Solara (Mila Kunis) and sends her out back to get some water. She goes out back to get the water, but Redridge steps in front of her. She makes him move aside and fills Elis canteen. In the bar, a cat steps on his pack and he nudges it away. The lead Biker approaches Eli, ready to fight him. Eli subdues him easily and decides to leave without collecting his water. However, the entire bar attacks him. He fights and kills all but one but one biker, who Solara begs be spared. Redridge and Carnegies men hold Eli at gunpoint and bring him to Carnegie.
Carnegie is impressed to meet Eli. He recognizes Elis immense skill and the fact that he is also an educated man who knows scripture. He tells Eli and that men like him, who are older but know things, are the future. He asks Eli to stay so that Carnegie can utilize his fighting skills to keep control over the town. Eli tells Carnegie that he has no interest in staying but Carnegie forces him to stay the night.
Redridge sends Claudia to deliver Eli food. He recognizes that Claudia is blind and asks her if she was blind her whole life or blinded by The Flash, an event which occurred during the Last Great War. She confirms that she was blind her whole life. He thanks her for bringing him water. Carnegie decides that the best way to keep Eli in town is to have Solara, Claudias daughter, sleep with Eli. Claudia begs him not to use Solara, but he sends her anyway. Eli doesnt want to have sex, but Solara begs him to keep her in the room since she is afraid for her mothers life. Eli and Solara eat together and she sees that Eli has a Bible, but doesnt recognize what it is. Eli teaches her to pray and the two go to bed.
The next morning at breakfast, Solara tries to recite the prayer with her mother but forgets the Amen, which Carnegie supplies. He beats Claudia in front of Solara in order to find out if Eli has the book he seeks. When Solara signs him the cross on the cover, Carnegie orders Redridge to bring the book to him. When they get to the room, they see that Eli snuck out. Redridge kills the guard on duty and gathers the men to find him. Across the street, Eli gathers his battery and prepares to leave.
Carnegie goes over to Eli and begs him to stay and give him the Bible. He tells Eli that he isnt afraid to kill Eli and take the Bible, since he thinks that it is the best way to keep the town under his control with the words which can keep people righteous. Eli tells Carnegie that he dreams of finding a town where the people need the book, but he tells Carnegie that it is not here. Carnegie orders Redridge to shoot Eli as he walks away but Redridge misses twice. A shootout ensues and Eli kills most of Carnegies men and wounds Carnegies knee. Redridge sees Eli as fearless and begrudgingly lets him leave. Behind the scenes, Claudia tells Solara to follow Eli, since she will be safer away from Carnegie.
Carnegie gets his leg treated by a doctor. The bullet and shrapnel are removed and he is bandaged up. He tells Redridge to prepare the vehicles to pursue Eli and recover the book. Redridge tells Carnegie that most of their men are dead and decides to use the book as leverage to get Solara as his concubine. Carnegie humorously, albeit reluctantly, agrees.
Eli travels down the road until Solara catches up to him. She wants to join him but she is rejected from the start. She offers to take him to the water supply Carnegie uses in exchange for the right to serve as his companion. He tricks her and locks her in the watering hole. She scrams and calls him a liar but Eli insists that he isnt, wishing her well and leaving on his way.
Solara breaks out of the storage room and continues to go in the direction Eli was going. She doesnt find him, but instead finds the woman who worked with the marauders from early with her broken cart. She tries to help the woman, but the woman insists that she leave to keep from getting raped and killed. Two marauders attack Solara and just as they are about to rape her, Eli shoots one through the testicles with an arrow and then shoots the other through the throat. Solara hugs Eli and the two go off on their way.
Carnegie and Redridges men find the bodies of the marauders. They reckon that Eli cant be more than a few miles ahead. Redridge finds a piece of Solaras custom clothing and tells Carnegie with displeasure. Carnegie asks if Redridge still wants her and walks back to the car. One of their henchmen suggests that they call it a day, since their cars will give them away at night and they could drive right by the pair.
Eli and Solara sleep in an old nuclear power plant. Eli reads the book and Solara asks Eli to read it to him. He recites a bit of it and then puts the book away. She asks him to teach her how to read it but Eli doesnt respond. When she thinks hes asleep she goes to take a look at the book in his bag. She sees (but cant read) an old K Mart tag which says Hi, my name is Eli. Eli grabs the bag away from her and makes her go back across the room, cocking his shotgun to make her know how serious he is.
The next day the pair set off and walk West. Solara asks him about the world before the War. He tells her that people had more than they needed and threw away things that others kill for today. She asks him why he keeps the book and Eli explains that it is the only bible left in the world since it was singled out for extermination during the War. He then explains why he keeps heading west, which perplexes Solara but she eventually comes to accept that Eli is acting on his faith. He explains how he found the Bible, insisting that a Voice told him where to go and that he would be protected. Solara thinks that Eli is delusional but says nothing.
The pair arrives at an old house with a sign that says No Trespassing. Eli tries to open the door, but a trap opens up and the two fall into a hole. They find themselves at the mercy of Martha (Frances de la Tour) and George (Michael Gambon), an elderly couple who have lived in their house for years. They ask why they didnt obey the sign and Eli apologizes, saying he didnt see it. They give Eli and Solara tea and then show them a cemetery filled with the people who attacked their house. Eli tells Solara that its time to go, insisting that the couple are cannibals who ate their victims and could have drugged the tea. As they leave, Carnegies caravan passes and sees the pair exiting the house. Eli and Solara re-enter the house and George and Martha pull out their gun cache from under the sofa.
A stand off ensues. Carnegie tells Eli to through out the book. Everyone is ready for the gunfight. A covered book is hurled through the window. Redridge looks at it and realizes its a bomb, throwing it away and running for cover. Two cars explode, killing several men. Eli and company fire their weapons until Redridge pulls out an RPG missile and blows half the house up, killing Martha. George starts shooting wildly, killing men left and right until Carnegies men bring out a gattling gun and blast him away along with most of the house. Eli and Solara are surrounded and dragged out of the house.
Carnegie threatens to kill Solara, to the dismay of Redridge. Redridge entreats Eli to surrender the book and Eli tells Redridge where he hid it. Redridge recovers the book and gives it to Carnegie, who releases Solara. He says God is good. and Eli responds all the time. Carnegie responds Well. Not all the time and shoots Eli in the stomach. He puts Solara in one van with Redridge and a driver and then takes the book with him in the other.
In the other van, Redridge puts Elis machete on the dashboard and chuckles to himself now that Eli is gone. Solara uses the string from Eli's bow that she had in her pocket and chokes the driver until the car flips over. The driver is killed and Carnegies men turn around to go to the crash. Solara throws a grenade, blowing up the third car. Solara goes to the drivers seat and sees Redridge was impaled by Elis machete. He pulls the Machete out and steps out of the vehicle with grace. Collapsing on his knees in penance, he dies. Solara drives away and Carnegie opts not to go after her since he has the book.
She returns to the house and finds that Eli is missing. She finds him walking West, feverishly repeating his need to go West. She puts him in the car and he treats the gun shot wound with duct tape. She apologizes for losing Elis book but Eli responds that its time he put the lessons he learned to use: to do more for others than you do for yourself. They drive to the remnants of the Golden Gate Bridge and Eli says that they are close. He gets a row boat and starts to row toward Alcatraz Island. He gets weak, so Solara takes over. An armed guard calls out to the pair and Eli responds that he has in his possession a King James Bible. The guard lets him in.
Eli is taken to Lombardi (Malcolm McDowell), the curator of Alcatraz, who has been gathering all sorts of old items, such as books, vases, paintings, and storing them in the cells until they are ready to rebuild and reestablish society. Lombardi tells Eli that they have been missing a copy of the Bible, so Eli tells him to get a piece of paper and pen. He starts to recite the Bible word for word, having memorized it over the last 30 years.
Back in town, Carnegie tries to open the bible but realizes that he didnt take Elis key to the book. He calls the Engineer in to unlock the book and once its unlocked we see the truth. The Bible is in braile. Eli is blind. A focus on his eyes reveals that they have been dead since the Flash and that he has been traveling, fighting and reading through use of his other senses. Carnegie tries to get Claudia to read it but she cruelly lies and tells him that shes forgotten. She tells him that his leg stinks and that hes feverish: signs of an infection. Meanwhile, Carnegies few remaining men are killed and it becomes clear that in his quest for the book, Carnegie has lost control. He collapses in despair.
In Alcatraz, Eli shaves all his hair and changes into a white robe. He recites the Bible to completion while Lombardi writes it down word for word. Eli dies from his gunshot wound but completes his task. Upon completion he utters one last prayer for Solara and the world before he dies. He is buried in Alcatrazs court yard garden. Solara pays her respects, takes his machete and iPod and leaves Lombardi to return home and find her mother, presumably also spreading the word about Alcatraz and Eli in the process.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1037705/synopsis
