Hereafter

Frankie McLaren,George McLaren,

Bryce Dallas Howard

Rating: **

A LIFE that’s all about death is no life at all,” says Matt Damon’s character George in the film. The same is true of Hereafter,a film about three different people and their different experiences with death that never really throbs with life. These three characters that the movie revolves around are: Paris-based journalist Marie (De France),who is given up for dead during the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami before she rises coughing up water; San Francisco-based psychic George who has the gift of knowing everything about a person after just about a second of holding their hands,particularly connecting to their loved dead ones; and London resident Marcus (Frankie/George McLaren),who has been shattered by the death of his twin brother. In the unhurried pace of an Eastwood film,the three go about their daily lives even as the shadow of death looms large over them. Despite the pathos that pervades this existence,or because of the unrelenting nature of it,you don’t really feel anything for Marie,George or Marcus. You only keep wondering how long they will grieve alone till their paths eventually cross — as these inevitably will.

Towards that end,the film perfunctorily addresses questions of afterlife,and what really happens when one dies. But these are not serious or conclusive discussions,just momentary reflections on a topic that’s too broad and difficult for this film to tackle. Its characters as a consequence float through the miasma,left to make as many surmises as you and me.

When Eastwood does break for moments of warmth,giving the characters a chance to be other than what’s written for them,they resonate with intense feeling. Especially the brief exchanges between George and his partner Melanie (Howard) at an Italian cooking class. Where he is quiet and withdrawn,dull and sullen in his appearance,she wears reds and maroons,is vibrant in her laughter and her sudden tears,and especially startling in the intensity of her gaze.

A session in that cooking class involves one partner in blindfolds being fed a spoonful of different kinds of preparations by the other,and having to guess the ingredients. That scene is fraught with a sensuousness that makes you wish Eastwood and writer Peter Morgan (The Queen) had gone further down that path.

In another scene,the writer-director pair paints a picture of inseparable twins and the bonds that bind them through one brief little photo shoot. However,Hereafter has precious little time for here and now. Tragically,when it does eventually meander around to it,the thereafter seems too neatly contrived.

shalini.langer@expressindia.com