Hereafter Bluray

Posted In: Hereafter

Lanny Knispel says...

With a title like HEREAFTER, why would anyone expect non-stop action scenes?Get a grip, you naysayers.HEREAFTER is a spiritual film, plain and simple.And one of the best films of the year.Not only does it deal with life and death, but how a near-death experience changes a person.And how other people can't understand it.This could've been a really corny movie, but Eastwood did a fantastic job making it real and heartfelt.Highly recommended.And for the naysayers--stick to movies like THE UNSTOPPABLE.That's about all your attention span can probably handle.

Posted on May 28, 2011

Shin Shiflet says...

It doesn't matter if you come from London, Paris or San Francisco. It doesn't matter if we speak the same language.

We live in the same world, undergo similar experiences, and respond to those experiences in different ways.Some of those experiences offer insights into something more that lies beyond the everyday reality you can see hear of touch.



A female French tv journalist has a near death experience in an island resort in the tsunami which jolts her out of her ordinary everyday reality. A 12 year old London boy copes with the sudden death of his twin brother goes into foster care while his mother goes into rehab, and seeks answers, and Matt Damon plays a reluctant 'real' psychicin San Francisco who people seek in their quest for answers. He has the gift which he considers a curse.If you are like me, as you watch you wonder if there is an invisible thread that will somehow connect these three stories, will their paths somehow cross.



Hereafter shows a major shift in direction for Clint Eastwood, and Matt Damon. All of Clint Eastwood movies tend to be grounded in reality, whereas Hereafter moves to a metaphysical level.Matt Damon often plays action heroes, not renowned for their psychic abilities.



Matt Damon plays a blue blue collar worker who has spurned his spiritual gift in favor of labor.He used to be famous, and now chooses to be anonymous and his brother encourages him to return to this potentially lucrative life.As the movie progresses and we see the interaction between him and Bryce Dallas Howard, (Ron Howard's daughter), we understand how his gift which is activated by touch, blocks him from true intimacy and prevents him from having a proper romantic relationship.



I particularly enjoyed watching the San Francisco sequences. The bar scene between Matt Damon, and his brother played by Jay Mohr was filmed at the Final Final, my local bar, and he sits at the exact same spot I often sit at.In fact, I had a near Clint experience. He left the bar, after one of the patrons got a little out of control, and I arrived twenty minutes later.Darn..Can you imagine.Clint Eastwood practically at your doorstep, and you miss him.



I loved watching the local scenes, many of the interior shots were filmed in real locations, you get the sense of an ordinary cramped walk up apartment in San Francisco, and the flash of the Hobart Building, before the office scene. This adds to the authenticity of the movie.How many movies have you seen where somebody has a regular job yet lives in a fancy loft.



A couple of scenes in this movie I thought were remarkable, one where where he spoon feeds her while she is blindfolded.I also love the scene where he gives the final reading, and ad libs a comforting message even though you can tell from hisfacial expression that he has lost the connection.Even real psychics can be fake sometimes.Beautifully played.



It's worth mentioning that other than Matt Damon, this cast is mostly full of unknowns, the standard of the actors is amazing.English actress, Lyndsey Marshal demonstrates tremendous presence, as Martin's mother.Bryce Dallas Howard though young looks like a long ago movie star.Cecile de France, the Belgian born French actress, has a certain chic appeal, and is a well established actress.



If you are like me sometimes when you see a movie, you forget about it almost immediately, I find myself still thinking about this one a week later.If you are curious to go see this one, you still won't know what you don't already know.



If you like this movie, I recommend Aftershock, which has some parallels with this movie.Set in China, instead of a tsunami we have an earthquake, and a mother is faced with the crushing dilemma of only being able to save one of her twin children the girl or the boy.By lifting the concrete beam under which they are trapped one will be saved, and the other will die. Based on the real event of the Tangshan earthquake in which 240,000 people perished, it's one of the most powerful of the year, and sure to be nominated for best foreign movie.

Posted on May 29, 2011

Sirena Klarr says...

There are some wonderful five star reviews that you can listen to if you have not seen the movie yet.



It may have seemed slow in this flash/bang/whizz lightening speed laugh-a-minute, dripping blood and guts era of moviedom. However, I remember movies with plots that involved human beings in ordinary lives punctuated with extraordinary moments. A story worth getting caught up in. Humor and drama. And I guess by today's standards, those movies were slow. But the dialogue was worth listening to and remembering as you followed the characters through the story. As you participated with the characters, each and every one.



That's what I loved about "Hereafter". And that's why I could have lived in it another hour. At least.

Posted on May 30, 2011

Rich Amill says...

Having just seen this film I wanted to see what others had to say.

The intutive,and insightfullness of Muzzlehatch,well he was right on.......I will not

be lenghthy in my comment.Regardless of your upbinging, and I am referring to any religous teaching or thoughts, this film is about life.....what we know, have been told by those who have experienced the "near death" and have lived and how each of us choose to use this knowledge in our own lives.

The slowness of the film is not a deterrant, it is refreshing, gives you time to appreciate the completeness of the emotions and reactions.In praise of Clint Eastwood, would anyone expect anything but the very best from this man of character?A film that will be in my mind forever.

Posted on May 31, 2011

Dennis Darcey says...

HEREAFTER deserves a very mixed review because it deals only superficially with the supernatural and offers no real answers despite the fact that its craftsmanship is undeniable.



After a brilliant start with the tsunami wrecking havoc as giant waves sweep over an entire village beach front, I expected HEREAFTER was about to delve into and explore the possibilities of an afterlife.



Instead, we examine the lives of three separate individuals whose lives are about to converge rather unconvincingly at the finale. Meantime, we have no idea where the story is going until the final scene. There's an uneven quality to the thread of the story with many scenes played too long before getting near the payoff.



But overall, the acting is excellent, particularly that of the little boy FRANKIE McLAREN who plays the twin brothers effectively, CECILE DeFRANCE, the French woman who almost drowns during the tsunami and her lover (THIERRY NEUVIC), who makes the deepest impression as far as acting and charisma goes. MATT DAMON is effective as the psychic who wants nothing more to do with his "gift." But at all times, the script gives nothing more than a surface treatment of the hereafter and avoids delving into a deeper look at the supernatural implied by the film's title.



HEREAFTER could have been a great film. As it is, it's uneven, slowly paced, and avoids the paranormal aspects that its title implies will be touched, especially since its main character is a psychic. But on the credit side, the opening sequence is amazing for its special effects. Unfortunately, what follows is not as absorbing, challenging or thought-provoking as it ought to be.



The cooking class scenes between BRYCE DALLAS HOWARD and MATT DAMON were dragged out and less than satisfying, due to her irritating habit of delivering giggles with each line to suggest the airiness of her character. Furthermore, their relationship is never fully explored once he agrees to do a psychic reading. She just disappears from the plot line after foolishly begging Damon to practice his skill. The script might have taken a better turn if it resolved their relationship in a meaningful way for the conclusion. Likewise, there are other scenes that are totally irrelevant and give the story a lack of focus.



An attempt to end the story of our three main characters on a bright note is only so-so in effect. I'd have preferred a deeper look at the supernatural than this hints at being and the ending just seemed downbeat and contrived.



The acting throughout is uniformly fine and special praise is due MATT DAMON, THIERRY NEUVIC and FRANKIE McLAREN, all giving top-rated performances. Clint Eastwood's direction is fine but the script presented too many obstacles for any director to overcome.

Posted on June 1, 2011

Armando Buechel says...

Eastwood the Director may wind up in history more well-known than Eastwood the Actor, and for the man who played Dirty Harry and The Man With No Name, in addition to brilliant starring roles in his own films such as Unforgiven and Million Dollar Baby - that is saying something.



Hereafter is a film with three different plots headed toward a common destination.In one strand Cecile De France plays Marie, a Parisian Journalist who is saved from drowning in a tsunami and finds that she can't extricate her private and professional lives from the experience.Frankie and George McLaren play twin brothers Marcus and Jason.The brothers have a drug-addicted single mother and share the task of shielding her and themselves from the authorities before tragedy strikes.In the final thread Matt Damon plays George Lonegan, the character you know the other characters are moving toward.



George has the ability to talk to the dead through contact with people who have connections to the deceased.He explains halfway through the film that he developed this ability after a near-death experience, and although his brother (played by Jay Mohr) thinks "the gift" is a gold-mine that should be exploited, George tries explaining repeatedly that it is a curse rather than a blessing.(Any person George touches floods him with images of the dearly departed.)



The film moves slowly.After the opening Marie doesn't want to be a journalist so much as explore the world of near-death experiences.We see young Marcus visiting sham psychics.In a series of scenes we see Damon's George reluctantly give "readings".One of the strengths of the film is that it contrasts the work of the fake psychics, who use clues obtained reading body language and facial expressions, with the dilemma of a person like George, who can't turn his power off, which invariably makes it impossible for him to develop actual relationships. How can you be "normal" if every time you touch a fellow human - you see dead people? Bryce Dallas Howard plays a pleasant woman George meets in cooking class.George attempts to hide his psychic ability from her, but when she finds out, she pressures him into a reading.What begins looking like a simple parlor trick instead rips open decades-old wounds.



For action addicts the film moves glacially after the tsunami scene, but the emotional payoff at the end is worth the trip.

Posted on June 2, 2011

Garnett Almond says...

A tsunami rushes in on an island resort where Marie (C

Posted on June 2, 2011

Shiela Stroebel says...

Clint Eastwood, one of my favorite actors of my youth, now partially retired as an actor is now dedicated to film directing. Im very very impressed by this film as Clint covers new ground dealing with life after death experiences and psychic phenomena that like the film suggests, there are people out there that have this GIFT and others are scammers.



PLOT - This movie is 3 stories going on at the same time: A woman in Tsumani on vacation that experiences death. Two close twins and one of the dies and Matt Damon a retired psychic that was laid off and decided to take a break and go to England. With a magical twist of fate, all these 3 people meet each other at a Book Fair in London.



This movie is a masterpiece and is real proof to me that MATT DAMON as an actor can cover a lot of ground which is a talent that not all actors are able to do.



RATING 10



RAY ST JOHN

Posted on June 3, 2011

Pam Shillings says...

Yes this movie is slow, and I was surprised by the subtitles in the beginning.However, I liked that it wasn't obvious how the subplots would reconcile themselves (like in most movies today), and the acting is very good, the story is interesting, and the movie is ultimately moving and rewarding.



I also enjoyed being introduced to actor Cecile De France.Although she was new to me,she has starred in numerous films in Europe, and I have already started reserving some at my local library.

Posted on June 4, 2011

Marlen Hubertz says...

Many of us have a terrible tendency to pigeonhole filmmakers into the genres we think they're best suited for. When I first saw the trailer for "Hereafter," I, like much of the moviegoing public, was unpleasantly surprised at the thought of Clint Eastwood having directed a supernatural drama. Given his recent triumphs with films like "Mystic River," "Million Dollar Baby," "Changeling," "Gran Torino," and "Invictus," it just didn't seem like something he would have or should have done. As usual, I was reacting impulsively; "Hereafter" is an incredibly strong film, in large part because Eastwood resisted the temptation to treat it as a thriller. It certainly has mysterious elements, but for the most part, it's a poignant, thought-provoking story of how different people react to traumatic circumstances.



The common thread of the story is death - or, more accurately, what awaits us after we die. Although glimpses of a spiritual void are revealed, neither Eastwood nor writer Peter Morgan makes any grand claims as to what it is or how it works. In other words, the film assumes the reality of life after death, but it doesn't linger on details such as heaven, hell, purgatory, or anything else resembling eternal punishment or eternal reward. There isn't even a discussion about the existence of God. This isn't a criticism. We've seen far too many movies in which deathly states are both explicitly examined and regarded with either extreme sentimentality or extreme terror; "Hereafter" wisely avoids these clich

Posted on June 8, 2011