The surprises Perelman has for you along the way will blow your mind and have you talking hours after you leave the theater.
The Life Before Her Eyes (2008)
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Reviews Counted:91
Fresh:22
Rotten:69
Average Rating:4.4/10
Consensus: Despite earnest performances, Life Before Her Eyes is a confusing, painfully overwrought melodrama.
Rated: 15 [See Full Rating] for violent and disturbing content, language and brief drug use
Runtime: 90 mins
Genre: Dramas
Theatrical Release:27-03-2009
Synopsis: Imaginative, impetuous and wild, Diana (Evan Rachel Wood) can’t wait for her adult life to begin. Whiling away the final days of high school in the lush springtime, Diana tests her limits with sex... Imaginative, impetuous and wild, Diana (Evan Rachel Wood) can’t wait for her adult life to begin. Whiling away the final days of high school in the lush springtime, Diana tests her limits with sex and drugs as her more conservative friend Maureen (Eva Amurri) watches with concern. But Diana’s aura of invincibility is shattered when a senseless act of violence erupts at school, forever changing the lives of the two best friends. Fifteen years later, a grown Diana (Uma Thurman) is still trying to come to terms with the traumatic events of that fateful day. On the surface, the adult Diana has made a picture perfect life for herself. She’s still living in the sleepy Connecticut suburb she grew up in with her husband Paul, a professor at the local college. Her beautiful young daughter, Emma, is smart and creative, and possesses a fiercely independent streak reminiscent of her mother. But all is not well—as the anniversary of her adolescent trauma approaches, the darkness that Diana has tried to escape closes in. Meanwhile, her husband has become increasingly absent, her daughter has taken to hiding from teachers, and worst of all, Diana’s own grip on reality is starting to falter. Moving seamlessly through both stages of Diana’s evolution, THE LIFE BEFORE HER EYES delves deep into the crossroads that we all face—where a simple decision can change the course of everything to come, and where a lifetime can be encapsulated in a single moment. With THE LIFE BEFORE HER EYES, Vadim Perelman, director of the acclaimed HOUSE OF SAND AND FOG, has established himself as one of America’s greatest young directors of serious, probing drama. --© Magnolia [More]
Starring: Uma Thurman, Evan Rachel Wood, Eva Amurri, Oscar Isaac
Starring: Uma Thurman, Evan Rachel Wood, Eva Amurri, Oscar Isaac, Gabrielle Brennan
Director: Vadim Perelman
Director: Vadim Perelman
Screenwriter: Emil Stern
Producer: Vadim Perelman, Aimee Peyronnet, Anthony Katagas
Composer: James Horner
Studio: Magnolia Pictures
Reviews for The Life Before Her Eyes
It's an underrated, and horrific little dramatic thriller that twists the noose at every turn...
The Life Before Her Eyes has the core of an inventive narrative and a twist that probably worked better as a literary device.
Just ignore the critics -- in this case, we don't know what we're talking about.
Studio movies rarely depict Christians as fallible, thoughtful people who've been strengthened by faith but don't take it for granted.
The twist is exactly what you think it is, and it pretty much invalidates any emotional investment you can work up before it arrives.
Should my life flash before my eyes before my demise, I am certain that movie scenes will appear. I only ask that this movie not be included in the edit.
(The Life Before Her Eyes) is one of those films that you will walk out of just feeling very shaken up and disturbed.
That the ending doesn't play fair with the audience is a misdemeanor; the felony is that the filmmakers don't seem to realize what an ugly moral statement they're making with it.
... not so much a bad movie as an infuriating one, a pretty empty thing that wants desperately to be loved for its deep thoughts.
Director Vadim Perelman...makes a misstep with the well crafted but flawed The Life Before Here Eyes.
In the end, Life is a challenging success, with Wood's performance again affirming her status among the young generation of actors, and Perelman's vision promising more intrigue to come.
[J]ust when you think you're getting an interesting movie about women and their travails and triumphs, the whiffs of a Shocking! Twist! Ending! begin to appear."
And then, THUD. Like an Acme anvil, the ending smashes everything to smithereens and you're left as discouraged as Wile E. Coyote.
Diana pays for her bad choices perpetually, in large part through her self-comparisons to M, whose piety she alternately teases and reveres.
Full of fussed-over significant images and delicately planned interlocking narrative motives, and it's about as subtle and clever as somebody clubbing you over the head with a folding chair
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