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Hereafter
doesn’t necessarily
deserve a page-long
rant about how bad
it is but it does
need to be addressed
that this isn’t just
Clint Eastwood
missing on a
directorial effort,
but striking out.
The film feels lost
and discombobulated
throughout and a
decent idea for a
film is spoiled by
interesting casting
decisions, some poor
writing, and a
pacing to it that
feels altogether
lost.
Hereafter
follows three
different people
with different
connections to death
and different
thoughts on the
afterlife. George
Lonegan (Matt Damon)
is a psychic living
in San Francisco
whose life has been
ruined by his gift.
He can’t have a
meaningful
relationship with
another person
because every time
he touches them he
gets visions about
their personal lives
through people
they’ve lost in the
past. He lives a
life of torment
because he’s lonely
and being around
other people whose
main concern is
death weighs on him.
Marie Lelay (Cécile
De France') is a
renown French
journalist. The
movie starts
following her in
Thailand right
before the 2004
tsunami hits. The
tsunami hits, Marie
almost dies and sees
a ton of people
dying all around her
and experiences the
near-death
experience. She’s
hit hard by her
experience and wants
to know more about
what she went
through regardless
of the cost it takes
on her career.
Marcus and Jason are
twin boys living in
London who live a
troubled life with
their
alcoholic/drug-addict
mother. Marcus’ life
is torn apart when
his brother Jason
gets hit and killed
by a car while
running an errand
for his mother.
Marcus struggles
with the loss of his
brother and seeks a
way to communicate
with him. The movie
follows the three’s
story and experience
with death until the
their stories
intertwine.
Hereafter
is a lost effort
because of the three
stories. There’s too
much going on and
too little at the
same time. Each
person struggles
with a tremendous
amount of misery for
the majority of the
movie. Marie’s life
is torn apart after
his experience,
George’s life was
never great in the
first place, and
poor Marcus’ life is
tough
in the first place
and in a tougher
tougher spot near
the end of the
movie. Sure you feel
awful for the
characters but you
never connect with
them. They seem
detached and distant
throughout the movie
and it’s impossible
to connect with
them. Where I found
the movie to
struggle the most
was how long it
followed each
character. Each
section varied in
length, and some of
segments took way
too long and some of
them took too short.
Marie’s Tsunami
experience was a
brilliant scene with
some huge special
effects and some
rivoting story, but
then it abrubtly
ends and switches to
a different story.
You have to wonder
whether just
devoting the movie
to her and possibly
George would have
made more sense.
Instead it’s just a
clustered mess.
As
for what Eastwood
did correctly it’s
hard to argue his
genius behind a
camera. He never
fails to make a
movie that looks
good and
Hereafter
looks brilliant. The
Tsunami scene is so
good that its terror
and intensity pours
out of the screen.
The quiet moments of
silence and
stillness are also
captured brilliantly
across the board
with all the
characters. You
can’t say he didn’t
make a movie that
looked good; it was
just a picture that
was lost in its
preproduction
phases.
As for bonus
features, there are
two main features
accompanying this
blu-ray. There’s the
Focus points feature
where key points in
the movie are broken
into with a special
feature piece. Most
of them feature
Eastwood and he
talks about making
the tsunami scene,
casting for the
film, and a few
other things. It’s
not an amazing
feature- there’s 40+
minutes of
additional footage
to watch here
though. The other
big feature is the
two hour documentary
‘The Eastwood
Factor” done on
Clint Eastwood. The
film is narrated by
Morgan Freeman and
it’s a great
documentary piece on
an icon in American
cinema that will
make you want to
watch previous films
that the director
has made and starred
in.
This movie’s bonus
features are solid
and it looked and
sounded great. The
main problem with it
is a script that was
too ambitious not to
get lost in its own
intentions. It made
the rest of the
movie feel lost. For
a good price this
isn’t something to
look away from but
the quality of the
film suggests that
this is movie is
something that needs
to be rented or
watched on demand
because it’s
probably not going
to be watched more
than once.
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