AFTER LIFE : LIVING OR DEAD?

I’ve seen so many thrillers, suspense films and horror films that is the rare occasion when one can surprise me or better yet make my skin crawl. I know, perhaps that’s not an experience one might wish for. But I’m not talking about a movie that will revolt you like HOSTEL (which I hated), I’m talking about a movie that you know will stick with you, that will make you think and in so doing just give you a case of the willies. With the release of AFTER LIFE, a new film can be added to that list.

The movie starts with a couple that seem to be having problems. Paul (Justin Long) is definitely in love with Anna (Christina Ricci) but her responses to him seem hesitant. The pair begin the film in bed with Anna seeming somewhat detached. It isn’t until later that you know why.

The film moves to her day as an elementary teacher. At school she helps out a student named Jack (Chandler Canterbury) when picked on by older kids. Later when she goes to leave the school, an ominous set of lights shutting down as she walks leaves one with a sense that something is going to happen. When Jack suddenly shows, everything is back to normal. Or is it? After all, we’ve watched Anna taking meds along the way.

That night Anna and Paul are having dinner out, with Paul planning on making the big leap and proposing to her. But misunderstood cues lead to an argument and Anna leaving the restaurant. It is their last conversation as Anna ends up in an accident on the way home.

Now the scene shifts to the eerie. Anna wakes to find herself on the mortician’s table at the local funeral home run by Eliot (Liam Neeson). When she asks what she’s doing here, he calmly tells her that she is dead. But Anna refuses to believe this even though she can’t move. Eliot explains to her that everyone seems to face their mortality the same way, with a great amount of denial at first.

The movie focuses mainly on the interplay between these two from here on out, with the occasional side trip to the world outside the funeral home doors. We see that Anna’s mother, an overbearing invalid who wanted Anna there to take care of her forever, wasn’t fond of Paul. We see Paul dealing with the death of a woman he truly loved. And we see Jack trying to figure out just what is going on in this odd world.

But Eliot and Anna are involved in a back and forth discussion of life and death. Eliot takes to making speeches about how the living take for granted everything that they have. He continues to attempt to comfort Anna and ease her into the world of the hereafter. But Anna fights it all the way, clinging to life, or what she assumes is life.

Scenes involving nightmares for both Anna and Paul leave you wondering where their heads are at the moment. And as the conversations between Eliot and Anna progress, as he injects her with a drug that is supposed to help ease her muscles now succumbing to rigor mortis, you start to wonder…is Anna really dead or not?

And that becomes the creepiest part of this film. You watch and try to decipher any clues you are offered as you attempt to determine if Anna is really dead or not. And if she’s not dead, why is it that Eliot continues to tell her that she is? What reason could he have for lying to her?

I was afraid that this movie would have one of those trite endings where everything was hunky dory by the last reel. And then I was afraid that it would have one of those artsy endings where everyone dies. But, in fact, the end of this movie offers an ending that is acceptable, logical and terrifying all at the same time. More importantly, it’s a satisfying ending.

The look of the film is fantastic. The funeral home has a stately mansion look to it while the morgue in the basement has an antiseptic feel to it. The photography is wonderful with clear images to muddle the mind as you try to figure out the dead or not dead story.

All of the actors do a great job here. Long seems truly despondent over the loss of his fiancé. Ricci seems confused and yet forceful in her belief that she is not dead. And Neeson gives a stand out performance as the subdued mortician who feels he has been given a gift to talk to the dead.

I can see this film as one that will make viewers sit around and discuss it when it’s over. It’s one that will stick with you when the lights come on. And (unless you skip to the extras) you won’t know the answer for sure even when the film finishes. And at times that can be a good thing. This movie might not be everyone’s cup of tea, but I found it a movie that I didn’t watch with my finger poised on the fast forward button. And for me, those films are truly rare these days.