The souls of five strangers linger in limbo as they try to find a way to return to the land of the living.
AfterDeath certainly has enough ingredients to make a reasonably enjoyable movie. Unfortunately this promising premise is those half-decent looking special effects are wasted on a badly written script and poor casting choices.
One helpful bit of advice to good film-making is “Show, Don’t Tell”. Understandably, due to the complicated setup of their purgatory, there is room for some explanation so that they don’t lose their audience. However, it doesn’t stop there. There is just far too much exposition, to the point that it renders the movie boring.
The chemistry between the five strangers is just non-existent, and only two out of the whole group are remotely likeable – not including the main character. I found Miranda Raison’s depiction of Robyn to be cold, while Elarica Gallacher – who put in a great performance as Carmen in Oliver Frampton’s The Forgotten (2014) – didn’t shine through for me in this one. Her character, Patricia is painted as a vapid good-time girl who isn’t particularly interesting and doesn’t have anything useful to say. By the time the film finally decides to grant us a little more perspective on who she really is, it’s too late to care.
LAST WORDS:
It’s a shame that so many crucial components didn’t work out, as amongst all the mistakes and missteps there is a good movie in there somewhere – an imaginative and original one too.