Life After Life
2022
🎯 Verdict
✍️ Full Review
How wondrous is it that an entire web of many worlds get birthed around this one girl as the lynchpin who embarks on her journey through life and the chronicle is about the choices she makes. For all the maudlin varieties of devastating tragedies one after another that could befall on one girl, this four-episode show is surprisingly full of life thanks to the plaintive narration of Lesley Manville who brought a voice of equanimity to the massive ups and downs navigated by a wonderful Thomasin McKenzie. The repeated do-overs become more heart-tugging with the contemplative score, the gorgeous settings and the repetitive patterns of driveways with beautiful shrubbery on both sides, this adaptation by John Crowley of Kate Atkinson's seminal novel finds commensurable balance between unfortunate circumstances and the power of endurance. In all its chaotic mishaps, it is astonishingly serene and stable, as if the protagonist is an outside observer looking into the multiple versions of what could have been and what really is. A concept that has since been fairly done and dusted, Life After Alife finds new meaning from the cyclical rebirths with the help of Buddhist ethos. And as you watch McKenzie going through the ordeals, big and small, you can't help but feel, what can only be described in a short and simple manner; Everything. It's amazing how with this little materials and that too with just four episodes, a show could find such immense grace, melancholy through tiny imperceptible arrangements and rearrangements. I think it's because unlike other endeavors comprising this very theme, Life After Life doesn't do for the usual low hanging fruit of course correction even though very initially it tries that as a consequential mechanism rather it goes for the experiences as they come. Joy or otherwise. Atkinson's remarkable take on how she had to go through all that so that other people's existence around her could be made sure of, is outstanding and John Crowley breathed life into that idea quite phenomenally. It does not put the whole ouroboros theme into a rigid mold of curse or gift, not The Butterfly Effect nor About Time rather as a natural order of everything that eventually decays. As one character espouses life as this great adventure while another character retorts, claiming life is an obstacle course. Very deftly, with much care, Life After Life rebuts both by showing- An adventure is an adventure because it has obstacles. It's Rilke's "no feeling is final", which incidentally also ties back to McKenzie.