Afterlife with Liam Neeson

Written by Jonathan Jacobs

Eliot Deacon is a disturbing man. As a funereal mortician he is methodical and ostensibly caring. He performs his duties admirably to perfection. As a human being however he is more of a ghoul than his horrifyingly dim-witted victims. Ironically, the film Afterlife never seeks an answer to the centuries old question of “what happens after you die?” Instead it is content with sickening us with a diabolical serial murderer of sorts that prays on the living in their darkest of times so he may exact a form of revenge that only he deems appropriate. What is death if not a sport judged by the living?

     Anna Taylor (Christina Ricci) is a lovely, albeit pallid school teacher. Paul Coleman (Justin Long) is an attorney without any legal knowledge but he is for all intents and purposes a heartfelt man. His strongest desire on a fateful night is to propose to his girlfriend Anna at their favorite restaurant. For some reason beyond his control, Anna seems perturbed and combative rather than romantic and phlegmatic. This works against Paul as he is unable to pop the question. He never should have ordered her the duck, or insulted her mother. Go figure! Anna rants and raves in the middle of the restaurant and leaves Paul to pick up the check and the opprobrium.

     On the way home she is involved in a car accident. We are next privy to Anna waking up in a funeral parlor. She is surrounded by dead bodies but she herself feels very much alive. This is where we meet Eliot Deacon. As afore-described Eliot is a man operating a funeral home with peculiar motivations. This begins a sinister series of cat and mouse games between the Anna and Eliot. She believes she is alive and that Eliot is lying to her in order to hold her captive. His pep talks about how she never appreciated life are unwelcome and unrelenting. Throughout her ordeal he plays the judge, the jury and eventually the executioner. During the entire tribulation she (Ricci) is completely naked. This is undoubtedly the best part of this or any other movie!

     While Anna is busy trying to escape in order to contact Eliot and let him know she is alive, he is convinced she is not dead. The funeral director and the police stonewall him from seeing her body and call him crazy. All the while part of Eliot’s scheme is to continuously inject Anna with a powerful sedative/muscle relaxer to cause her to look dead and to appear lifeless to her mother and to the police investigator. To the very last moment Paul is convinced Eliot is a sick creep. Unfortunately, nobody believes him and people believe he is sufferance post traumatic stress disorder from Anna’s accident and alleged death.

     Keep in mind that I have spoiled the plot completely as we are never absolutely certain if Anna is dead or not. We want her to live despite the evidence to the contrary. Her situation grows increasingly desperate to the point where she is buried alive. After Eliot admits what has happened, on the way to rescue her before her coffin runs out of oxygen , Paul is also involved in an accident. Eliot follows him waiting to inject him with a serum to slow his heartbeat to convince the examiners on scene he has died.

     As I wrote in the first paragraph, Liam Neeson’s character is a mass murderer. His desire to punish the living and to judge them is a telltale sign he is a serial murderer with an inflated sense of self-importance and self-worth. When we find out Eliot cannot speak to the dead and that he photographs and maintains records of his countless victims we feel sick to our stomachs. Afterlife is not a film about redemption or learning the meaning of life and all of its infinite secrets, it is a picture about a remorseless murderer. Is it a suitably haunting film? To be sure it is. Is it intended to be a crowd pleaser? Only insofar as it was released in time for Halloween.  I recommend it if you enjoy sick movies. Otherwise stay away and avoid having nightmares.

Jonathan Jacobs

Member FFCC

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