Rating: 
Summary: Wonderful Film
Review: This is probably the best dramatic film I've ever seen. The acting is very good, and the story keeps you interested from the instant you here the premise until long after you're done watching it.
Rating:
Summary: subtle and mesmerizing
Review: A journey of mystery, humor, and thought provoking ideas that is filled with memorable images. A great dinner movie; it inspires conversation and thought.
Rating:
Summary: See This Movie!
Review: This has got to be at the top of my list of all time favorite films. It is really a beautifully put together piece of filmaking that deserves much more recognition than it received here in NY. It makes a beautiful statement of how the human race perceives the importance of, life, love, death, themselves, and eachother. Very psychological and well thought out. If you like movies that make you think once in a while, you will definitely enjoy this movie.
Rating:
Summary: Must see
Review: I would have to rank After Life up with Life is Beautiful, Wings of Desire, and Seventh Seal, as my favorite foreign films of all time. Anyone who won't watch foreign films just because of subtitles is missing the movie watching experience of a life time. The movie is well put thought out, wonderfully filmed, and with enough quirks to endear it to the viewer. Definitely a must see for fans of foreign. I am glad to hear that this is finally getting released
Rating:
Summary: One Memory
Review: _After Life_ was one of my numerous unopened DVDs that sat upon my one of my shelves untouched by human hands but caressed by a large amount of dust. Bored, I finally decided to view it today and I was not disappointed. The plot of the film is quite simple: Individuals who have recently passed away are asked by an after life bureaucratic bureau to select one incident from their lives to take along with them to the next world as the only thing that they will remember. However, instead of taking their memories along with them in their brains, a short film is made instead.If one is looking for a film with even a modicrum of action, this is not the film. For the most part this film has the feel of a documentary which, in a way, it actually is. 500 people were asked to relate what memory they would like to take to the next world, and the result is this film. In fact some of the "actors" in this film are not actors at all, but individuals expressing their favorites memories which includes an old man telling of when he was given water and rice by US soldiers, an old woman's memory of the dresses her older brother purchased her, and a young girl remembering how her mother cleaned her ears. There are also other individuals who feel as if they do not have any good memories so they have to search through their lives to find a spark of goodness. A great film that not only touches on what is important to various human beings, but on how memory and fiction mingle.
Rating:
Summary: It's a wonderful life
Review: The Japanese title of this film is "Wonderful Life," and wonderful it is. Kore-Eda uses the premise of choosing one memory for all eternity as a compelling way to explore themes of memory, closure, loss and existential meaning. The film starts out with interesting stories of unique memories recounted by actors and non-actors. A small plot develops as the story follows the case of an older, slightly arrogant retired salaryman who believes he lived a meaningful life but is having a hard time choosing his one memory. Keep in mind that people who hated this film probably prefer plot-driven dramas. "After Life" is driven by quiet observations, with a small plot driving the film's main statement. The thing that impressed me the most was Kore-eda's representation of heaven or the after life. Kore-eda's heaven evokes and celebrates so many aspects of Japanese daily life -- the school life of children, the driving productivity of salarymen, and the quiet, contented simplicity of the elderly population. The staff of counselors at this halfway-house to eternity scrub the floors and tidy up their office first thing in the morning the way my Japanese mother remembers doing at her school in 1950s Tokyo. Like salarymen, they discuss their increasingly heavy case load and the film follows the tense timeline of their one-week deadline to recreate and film the memories. The film also captures the beauty of falling autumn leaves and sakura (cherry blossoms) through the eyes of an elderly woman with Alzheimers. There is no idealism in Kore-eda's heaven. The staff's building looks like an old, run-down school house and the props they use to film their staged memories have a summer camp, high school production feel to it. Some of the dead change their minds about their memories, and one chooses not to pick at all. The staff is also faced with a corporate schedule and mom-and-pop resources, but things eventually fall into palce. Oddly enough, in Kore-Eda's heaven, there is no closure. The counselors who run the place have chosen for various reasons to not pick one memory for all eternity, and they must continue on with the daily frustrations of being human. People still experience unrequited love and loneliness in heaven. Counselors pass time by reading the encyclopedia volume by volume. There seems to be little solace, except in the closure one makes for oneself by finally choosing a memory. Kore-eda's film doesn't make any striking or profound statements about existential meaning, God or eternity. In fact, there are no evocations of God or a higher power. By singling out one memory (true or fabricated), the film almost suggests that the experience of living is really just "content" for us to draw from in deciding what the meaning of our existence has been in the end. The film benignly suggests that meaning doesn't seem to exist in its own right, it's something illusory that people create. We aren't faulted for needing illusions, it just seems to be an accepted part of our humanity. For such a quiet film to make such compelling and powerful observations, I give it 5 stars.
Rating:
Summary: refreshing, delicate and profound
Review: This is a slow and delicate film that touches human life at its core. It makes you stop and ask: What am I living for? WHat is important in my life? What have I learnt? in other words.... What would I like to take with me when I go.
The actors act with an immediacy that is direct, refreshing and sweet - there is little self-consciousness usually involved in "acting" ... possibly also because the Japanese are much less obsessed with the "self" than us Westerners.
In any case, the director did a superb job in coaxing the actors to be real, and he did it with VERY little money. If yu want to see a movie that will touch your heart and make you stop, and actually become aware of your life and its path, see After Life.
Rating:
Summary: Haunting and beautiful
Review: What a wonderful story. The simple story poignantly wraps the meaning of life into one moment of our memory. I cannot recommend this enough.
Rating:
Summary: Happiness lies in giving to others
Review: One of the most commonly reported aspects of near-death experiences is the life review, the seeing and re-experiencing of major and trivial events of one's life, sometimes from the perspective of the other people involved. Most say that the single most important lesson they learned is that the actions we think are trivial and unimportant turn out to be the most important, especially ones that involve spontaneous acts of love.
In After Life, by Hirokazu Koreeda, a group of recently deceased people are asked to look back at their life and choose only one memory that they want to take with them to eternity. The process compels people to look at their life in its entirety and see what worked and what was missing. In what looks like a dreary barracks-like way station, civil servants meet with those just crossed over to help them choose the experience they want to hold on to. For some, the choice is easy, for others it is quite difficult. Those that will not or cannot choose are consigned to work in the substation with the newly deceased until they are ready to move on. The counselors work one-on-one with each individual, telling them that they have three days to make their choice. Once a memory is selected, a film crew recreates the memory -- sets are built and the little touches of sights and sounds are selected until the deceased are satisfied that they are witnessing a perfect recreation of their experience. It is that film that they take with them, not the original memory.
At first some choose things such as a trip to Disneyland, a sexual encounter, or a memorable bowl of rice, but later gravitate toward experiences that are more meaningful. The center of the film revolves around those who are unable to choose. Ichiro Watanabe (Taketoshi Naito) is a 70-year old management consultant who has led an uneventful life and is challenged to find a memory he thinks is worth preserving for all time. To help him in this process, he is allowed to scan through piles of videotapes representing each year of his life. One young man wants to choose a dream instead of an actual event. Another wants to forget his past entirely, and an elderly woman is stuck in the mindset of a nine-year old girl.
After Life is the story of the caseworkers as well. Takashi Mochizuki (Arata) has been stuck in limbo because he cannot find any happiness in his twenty-two years until he realizes how his short life deeply affected someone else. His perfect realization also affects a co-worker Shiori (Susumu Terajima) who has fallen in love with him. After Life is a beautiful and touching film that allows us to reflect on the things that brought us joy in our own life, and to recognize that true happiness lies, not in outward symbols of success, but in giving ourselves to others.
Rating:
Summary: It's a wonderful life
Review: The Japanese title of this film is "Wonderful Life," and wonderful it is. Kore-Eda uses the premise of choosing one memory for all eternity as a compelling way to explore themes of memory, closure, loss and existential meaning. The film starts out with interesting stories of unique memories recounted by actors and non-actors. A small plot develops as the story follows the case of an older, slightly arrogant retired salaryman who believes he lived a meaningful life but is having a hard time choosing his one memory. Keep in mind that people who hated this film probably prefer plot-driven dramas. "After Life" is driven by quiet observations, with a small plot driving the film's main statement. The thing that impressed me the most was Kore-eda's representation of heaven or the after life. Kore-eda's heaven evokes and celebrates so many aspects of Japanese daily life -- the school life of children, the driving productivity of salarymen, and the quiet, contented simplicity of the elderly population. The staff of counselors at this halfway-house to eternity scrub the floors and tidy up their office first thing in the morning the way my Japanese mother remembers doing at her school in 1950s Tokyo. Like salarymen, they discuss their increasingly heavy case load and the film follows the tense timeline of their one-week deadline to recreate and film the memories. The film also captures the beauty of falling autumn leaves and sakura (cherry blossoms) through the eyes of an elderly woman with Alzheimers. There is no idealism in Kore-eda's heaven. The staff's building looks like an old, run-down school house and the props they use to film their staged memories have a summer camp, high school production feel to it. Some of the dead change their minds about their memories, and one chooses not to pick at all. The staff is also faced with a corporate schedule and mom-and-pop resources, but things eventually fall into palce. Oddly enough, in Kore-Eda's heaven, there is no closure. The counselors who run the place have chosen for various reasons to not pick one memory for all eternity, and they must continue on with the daily frustrations of being human. People still experience unrequited love and loneliness in heaven. Counselors pass time by reading the encyclopedia volume by volume. There seems to be little solace, except in the closure one makes for oneself by finally choosing a memory. Kore-eda's film doesn't make any striking or profound statements about existential meaning, God or eternity. In fact, there are no evocations of God or a higher power. By singling out one memory (true or fabricated), the film almost suggests that the experience of living is really just "content" for us to draw from in deciding what the meaning of our existence has been in the end. The film benignly suggests that meaning doesn't seem to exist in its own right, it's something illusory that people create. We aren't faulted for needing illusions, it just seems to be an accepted part of our humanity. For such a quiet film to make such compelling and powerful observations, I give it 5 stars.
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