Hollywood has been lacking in the originality department. “Freakier Friday,” another “Jurassic World” movie, a live-action “How to Train Your Dragon,” another “Mission Impossible movie, “Sonic the Hedgehog 3,” “The Bad Guys 2,” another “Smurfs” movie… I could go on.
One movie I can guarantee you haven’t seen before is Eternity. Despite being a rom-com, this new A24 movie is one of the most mature takes on love I’ve seen on the big screen.
The movie starts with an older couple: Joan (Elizabeth Olsen), who is dying of cancer, and Larry (Miles Teller), her husband of almost seventy years. We don’t get very far before Larry dies in a macabrely funny manner (choking on pretzels), and just a week later, Joan passes away too.
We’re off to a great start!
Our story doesn’t end here, as both Joan and Larry are reunited in the afterlife, but it’s nothing like you might picture. We’re told that all souls, after dying, have a week to decide where they want to spend eternity (helped by their afterlife assistants), which is a pretty big deal, given that once you pick your eternity, there’s no taking it back.
Seems simple. The old folks get to spend an eternity together in whatever happily-ever-after world they like, right?
There is one tiny issue, though. Larry wasn’t the first husband Joan had.
Yikes.
Her first man, Luke (Callum Turner), was a soldier who died at war, and he’s stayed in the afterlife’s “waiting room” for over six decades, hoping to one day reunite with Joan. That’s kinda hard to beat.
Now the choice isn’t between which eternity Joan will spend… well, eternity in. It’s the choice of which husband she’ll spend eternity with: Her first love, or her children’s father. All sorts of people will have all kinds of perspectives on this, but Joan has a week to make this decision and two men pulling her in very different directions.
Let’s pause for a minute, because what does “picking an eternity” even mean? Well, there are options. You have the catholic, Buddhist, Islamic, evangelical, and even satanic eternities. You could also try something more free-style, like museum world, man-free world, or even 1930s Germany (with 100% fewer Nazi’s).
The obvious answer to Joan’s dilemma would be to have both husbands in the same afterlife, but spending an eternity as the third wheel is, unsurprisingly, less than appealing. How does someone even tackle such an issue, then? Eeny-meeny-miny-moe? Coin flip? Thumb war? You’ll have to watch the movie to find out.
For a film about death, “Eternity” is tastefully funny while still tackling issues of grief and loss. It deep dives into what makes a romantic relationship successful, especially after suffering a loss of your own. The chemistry Joan has with each husband is what sells the whole thing, though: not every relationship is the same, but that doesn’t mean one dynamic is superior to the other. It’s quite apparent that Luke and Larry deeply love their wife for very different reasons, and watching the different dynamics play out on screen is magnetic.
In a world of Tinder swipes and hookup culture, “Eternity” is a timely story about love and the effort that goes into it.
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