Eternity

Now I went into this movie purely out of a love for Elizabeth Olsen thinking A24 was just attempting to redo Materialists with a different Marvel actress, but what I viewed was actually much more profound. The concept of being sent to your afterlife where a) you can only make one choice for eternity, b) your husband has made that choice for you, and c) your first husband has been waiting 67 years for you to finally get eternity together is a mind boggling decision in its own. Now you give that role to Elizabeth and tell her to do exactly what she does best, portray your grief both past and current (shoutout Wandavision, Sorry For Your Loss, and every other depressing Olsen film). She’s forced to grieve both of her husbands during her life and then grieve their existence and absence in the afterlife. It’s an impossibly weighted position that nobody would ever want to be in. Now you can weigh the arguments of a lifetime with Larry or the life you never had with Luke, but even that doesn’t simplify it. The decision the writers and David Freyne came to is ingenious given the theme and playthrough of the story. She gets a chance to pick both and she gets a chance to be wrong. It isn’t about your happiest moment or who’s most perfect or who’s willing to do what for you. It is literally a question of who do you know you could spent eternity with. Which is weighted of course, but also so much more simple. She has to pick Larry and she has to come to that realization overtime reliving her life and reminding herself why she loves him rather than being reminded. Of course on top of the plot the visuals in this movie are stunning and thank god we’re returning to an age of allowing saturation to exist in movies. Beautiful film, beautiful writing, gorgeous cast.