 |
| She
can’t make sense of it: Thurman in The Life Before
Her Eyes. |
Days
of Future Past
By
Shawn Stone
The
Life Before Her Eyes
Directed
by Vadim Perelman
Hallucinatory and emotionally wrenching, director Vadim Perelman’s
The Life Before Her Eyes is a powerful portrait of
woman’s breakdown on the anniversary of a high-school massacre
that shattered her life.
At least I think that’s what it’s about.
Shifting back and forth in time, we see teenage Diana McFee
(Evan Rachel Wood) on the day of the school shooting, and
Diana (Uma Thurman) today. Young Diana is cocky and devil-may-care;
she has a college-prof boyfriend (Sherman Alpert) with a telltale
douchebag’s goatee. She’s always chiding her best friend Maureen
(Eva Amurri) for her straight-laced, Roman Catholic ways.
(Note: Religion becomes more and more important as the story
goes on.) Adult Diana is a wreck, with a cute-but-crabby child
(Gabrielle Brennan) and a non-douchebag college-prof hubby
(Brett Cullen).
Based on a novel by Laura Kasischke, the film is incredibly
complex in structure; but director Perelman is in complete
control, and the action never confuses. (Confounds, yes; confuses,
no.) The film has a very distinct, overripe look: Every frame
oozes color. The fact that this doesn’t come across as tasteless
is an achievement in itself. The performances by Wood and
Thurman complement each other in well-thought-out ways, and
both impress; the handling of the school shooting is horrifying
but not sensational.
If everything about The Life Before Her Eyes is so
effective and affecting, you may be wondering, why is there
such a hedged tone to this review?
Because in the last third of the film, things get weird. OK,
weirder. I don’t want to give too much away, but the movie
turns into a kind of Twilight Zone episode—with a Roman
Catholic point of view. The final revelation is as horrible
as one would expect, and yet still a complete surprise. I
can’t fault it from a dramatic standpoint, because the filmmakers
ultimately do play fair with the audience. I also can’t say
I like the ending much, either.
Why?
Because thinking back about the last 20 minutes of the film,
I found myself pretty pissed off about the rationale ascribed
to Diana’s fateful decision during the massacre. As much as
I love movies as audacious as this, I prefer them without
a smug slab of moralism.
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