After.Life
directed by Agnieszka Wojtowicz-Vosloo
directed by Agnieszka Wojtowicz-Vosloo
Depending on your mood you might believe that this is an intelligent art film with a powerful message. Or you might think that it's a pretentious horror film that thinks it's smarter than it really is and uses tropes and cliches you've seen a million times before--including plenty of female star nudity-- to no great avail.
As referenced in HBO's Boardwalk Empire death will happen to us all eventually. But we don't know what it's like until we experience it. And once we do we can't tell anyone what it's like. All we know is that it's final.
So it's important to live life to the fullest, to give and receive love while we're here, to live each day as if it is our last, because one day we'll be correct. That's this film's underlying message. However it's wrapped in a horror movie packaging, that as mentioned, feels old and dull.
The movie is stylish and looks great. There's a visual coldness that makes perfect sense considering the subject matter and locations.
But there aren't necessarily any heroes or villains, well again depending on how you look at it. There's an essential emptiness to the story that makes it difficult to care about the characters.
Anna Taylor (Christina Ricci) is a middle school teacher who's in an up and down relationship with Paul (Justin Long), a lawyer. Sometimes she likes him; sometimes she does not. That's life right?
Death is also part of life, something that Anna is reminded of when she attends the piano teacher's funeral. The local funeral director and mortician is a detail oriented man named Eliot Deacon (Liam Neeson).
That evening Paul invites Anna to dinner. Paul has big news. Paul has an opportunity for a promotion requiring relocation. Paul would be a fool to decline. Paul believes he and Anna have been dating long enough. They both know where this relationship is going so--Anna assumes that this is Paul's break up speech. Anna insults Paul and storms away.
Anna is wrong. Paul wanted Anna to come with him and marry him. But that's what happens when you interrupt people. You never get the full story. Zooming down the highway during a rain storm and in an emotional state Anna crosses the median and is hit by a truck.
Waking up in the mortuary Anna finds that Eliot is preparing her for her upcoming funeral. Obviously if Anna can talk to Eliot then she must not be dead, right?
Anna can move and throw things. That is, she can do those things when Eliot is not pumping her full of chemicals that seem to cause paralysis. Eliot rudely explains to Anna that no she is dead. He just happens to have a gift for talking to dead people and convincing them to let go.
There's a lot of "I'm not dead!" and "Yes you are. Now shut up and let me help you!!". Eliot thinks that life is wasted on most people.
Eliot keeps photographs of those he's "helped". Paul has trouble accepting Anna's death, especially when Anna's disturbed student Jack (Chandler Canterbury) says that he saw Anna thru the funeral home window. Paul's suspicions are further raised when Eliot refuses to let him see Anna's body.
There's a fair amount of (mostly non-erotic) nudity by Ricci. Neeson helps keep story interest barely flickering but this wasn't a great movie imo.
