Hereafter

Clint Eastwood is pretty much golden. I haven't seen anything that he is involved in go bad so this was a pretty good bet. In Hereafter we get three (of course) seemingly unconnected stories that eventually connect. In the beginning, this played like a tame version of the Final Destination series. Knowing that the Matt Damon character spoke with the dead, the first few scenes stressed me out as I was waiting for someone to die. Fortunately, knowing that there were only three unconnected stories let me relax shortly into the film. After that, we get an interesting view on the meaning of death and how different people deal with death. This is not exactly a film about grief and death, but instead it is an emotionally serious look at how people choose to decide what is important in life. The most enjoyable moment of this film was just an insignificant snippet in the last third. Damon is at a book reading and listening to his favorite audio book reader read from one of his favorite books. I think that as an actor, if you are asked to beam with joy, that might be kind of easy. Here Damon is asked to be on the verge of beaming, but his personality does not allow him to beam. A 20 second clip featuring Damon in a personal and pure state of joy, breaking out in just a twitch of a smile. Maybe not that important, but made the film for me.

4 stars (out of 5)