6.2 | / 10 |
Users | 3.2 | |
Reviewer | 3.0 | |
Overall | 3.2 |
After a horrific car accident, Anna wakes up to find the local funeral director Eliot Deacon preparing her body for her funeral. Confused, terrified and feeling still very much alive, Anna doesn't believe she's dead, despite the funeral director's reassurances that she is merely in transition to the afterlife. Eliot convinces her he has the ability to communicate with the dead and is the only one who can help her. Trapped inside the funeral home, with nobody to turn to except Eliot, Anna is forced to face her deepest fears and accept her own death. But Anna's grief-stricken boyfriend Paul still can't shake the nagging suspicion that Eliot isn't what he appears to be.
Starring: Liam Neeson, Christina Ricci, Justin Long, Josh Charles, Chandler CanterburyHorror | 100% |
Thriller | 41% |
Drama | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.40:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1
English: LPCM 5.1 (48kHz, 16-bit)
English: Dolby Digital 5.1 (640 kbps)
English SDH, Spanish
25GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region A (C untested)
Movie | 3.0 | |
Video | 4.0 | |
Audio | 3.5 | |
Extras | 1.5 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
What's the point of preserving the body if the soul's already left?
After.Life is one of those ambitious Psychological Horror movies that looks good, lingers
about with a
fair bit of suspense, and features several fine performances, but at the end of the day, it seems like
little more than an inconsequential picture that's worth a watch but not worth remembering. To
the picture's credit, it attempts to delve into some pretty substantial thematic elements that deal
with the meaning of life, the purpose of death, and perhaps most fundamental to the story, the
differences between the two. Writer/Director Agnieszka Wojtowicz-Vosloo takes the right approach
with the material; she keeps her picture focused, honest, and completely within the scope of
more thoughtful and artsy Horror moviemaking. After.Life, then, allows both its story and
its audience
to focus on the details, themes, and ideas that are the backbone of the film without becoming
overwhelmed by unnecessary gore. The result is a well-crafted picture with good intentions, but it
never
hits quite all the right notes that would bring the full story and all its complexities into absolute
focus.
Maybe that's the objective, the picture in a roundabout way saying that it doesn't have all the
answers, but either way, After.Life, by its conclusion, feels a bit too shallow and unfinished
despite its noble efforts to take on a tough subject with class.
What would Haley Joel Osment make of all this?
Anchor Bay delivers After.Life to Blu-ray with a quality 1080p transfer. The image appears fairly glossy and free of excess grain and noise. The transfer appears consistently sharp, crisp, and clear, with only a few shots appearing ever-so-soft. Details are generally strong, particularly as seen in facial close-ups and the stone exterior of Eliot's funeral home and morgue. The film often sports a cold color palette -- those scenes within the depths of the morgue capture a steely blue and gray appearance -- but there are also plenty of scenes that showcase nicely rendered colors, usually appearing well-balanced and neutral in presentation. Blacks and flesh tones are consistently strong, but slight banding and blocking often appear in backgrounds throughout the film. After.Life features a technically sound but visually unremarkable viewing experience; it's the sort of material high def fans will take for granted, but other than some minor technical bugaboos, Anchor Bay's transfer delivers the goods.
A PCM 5.1 uncompressed soundtrack serves as the primary audio presentation accompanying this Blu-ray release of After.Life. Like the video presentation, it's of a high quality though not at a level where it's going to stand apart from the crowd. The track features a fair amount of surround information, usually generated by more powerful effects and music. Some rather trite "spooky whispering" flows about the soundstage and across the back in one scene, and some of the film's music enjoys a strong back channel support structure. Otherwise, ambience seems mostly limited to the front. A restaurant scene in chapter three features the slightest background nuances -- clanking dishes and chatty patrons -- though these elements are mostly carried across the front portion of the stage. Dialogue is generally strong but occasionally lacking in potency, sometimes playing as slightly shallow. Bass is limited to but a few brief elements that hint at a low end. Ultimately, this is an effective but somewhat generic soundtrack typical of a low-budget Horror/Thriller picture. Anchor Bay's track is solid enough for what it is, but it won't be remembered as a hallmark sound presentation.
After.Life arrives on Blu-ray with a few scattered extras. First up is an audio commentary track with Co-Writer/Director Agnieszka Wojtowicz-Vosloo. She offers up a fairly routine but well-informed commentary, discussing the actors and the characters they portray, the shooting schedule, the picture's themes, her personal thoughts on the subject material, her preparation for the film both technical and personal, the audiences' ability to interpret the movie in different ways, and plenty more. This is a nice companion to the picture, and those that enjoyed the movie would be well served to give it a listen. Delving Into the 'After.Life:' Making of Featurette (1080p, 7:59) features the director discussing the picture's story and the ideas it explores. Also included is the film's trailer (1080p, 2:01) and additional 1080p trailers for Pandorum, Frozen, I Spit on Your Grave, The Crazies, and The Disappearance of Alice Creed.
After.Life is an admirable picture of high aspirations but that ultimately finds only a modicum of success. It's impossible to fault the picture for trying -- what it wants to be is daring, inventive, and purposeful -- but in the end it leaves its audience unfulfilled and falls partially into genre cliché, the result a picture with promise but not quite the results it seems to have set out to find. On the flip side, the film sports a strong cast and solid direction, and if nothing else, its unfulfilled promise and unanswered questions will leave viewers talking long after the film's end. This Anchor Bay Blu-ray release delivers a quality technical presentation and a few extras. After.Life comes recommended as a solid rental.
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