David Freyne
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…it borrows the look and feel of the afterlife from Defending Your Life…
While Defending Your Life depicts the afterlife as a bureaucratic purgatory, Eternity’s afterlife is more like an airport purgatory.
The most disagreeable thing about it is how much it rips off Albert Brooks’ “Defending Your Life” (1991). The premise, nature of the jokes and themes explored are so similar that Brooks might want to seriously sue the screenwriters for plagiarism.
It boasts an inventive premise involving the afterlife that feels evocative of films such as Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s A Matter of Life and Death (1946), Albert Brooks’ Defending Your Life (1991)…
Any movie about the afterlife has to be compared to the 1991 Albert Brooks classic, “Defending Your Life,” which means it will always come up short.
By the final act, we’re just reminded of the much better realized afterlife rom/coms like the 70s HEAVEN CAN WAIT and especially Albert Brooks’ DEFENDING YOUR LIFE.
…the fact that this bureaucratic vision of death looks as if Beetlejuice’s afterlife had been designed by Ken Adam.
Freyne and co-screenwriter Patrick Cunnane flesh out the afterlife in a way that feels akin to the creation of the mind in Disney's Inside Out, or the afterlife in Beetlejuice.
The afterlife’s waiting room shares some DNA with Beetlejuice, as the recently deceased hop off a train and wait to meet their AC (afterlife coordinator) in a clinical lobby area.
Forget typical cinematic depictions of the pearly gates or Tim Burton's Beetlejuice dead-world weirdness.
Other afterlife rules (which are highly reminiscent of Tim Burton’s interpretation in Beetlejuice, but without the gothic aesthetic and horror elements) make less sense, such as the idea that each soul can choose only one paradise to live in.
What's your favorite movie about the afterlife?
Beetlejuice…
The Good Place already did a whole 4 seasons about what the afterlife would be like…
Da’Vine Joy Randolph and John Early steal every scene as afterlife administrators who seem to have wandered in from The Good Place.
“Eternity” may not contain the type of philosophical doctrine that even something like ABC’s “The Good Place” delivered, but there are more than a few background gags and amusing lines to satisfy the worldbuilding.
…en una especie de antesala a la eternidad con cierto toque a la burocracia en el Más Allá de 'The good place'…
The tone reminds me of “Defending Your Life” blended with “The Good Place,” but with an originality that finds the perfect balance of wit and warmth.
It’s a bureaucratic afterlife that feels equal parts existential and comic, a mix of The Good Place and a county fair.
It boasts an inventive premise involving the afterlife that feels evocative of films such as Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s A Matter of Life and Death (1946)…
Eternity never quite plumbs the thematic depths of obvious inspirations like A Matter of Life and Death and Defending Your Life, but maybe that’s fitting for a film filled with characters less interested in exploring the Big Questions than in finding a quiet place and the right person with whom to share it, whoever that might be.
Eternity se ubica en una tradición que va de A Matter of Life and Death (Powell & Pressburger, 1946) a What Dreams May Come (Vincent Ward, 1998), pasando por Ghost (Jerry Zucker, 1990).
The result is a grounded yet ethereal comedy that has all the wonder of A Matter of Life and Death and all the playful profundity of The Truman Show.
An unlikely rom-com with creative world-building that makes it feel part TV classic "The Good Place" and part "A Matter of Life and Death,"…
…and even afterlife romances (see Powell and Pressburger’s A Matter of Life and Death, 1946)…
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)
Directed by Michel Gondry
influenced Eternity (2025)
Visuals Themes
Freyne’s treatment resorts to predictable and familiar notes, such as a chaotic chase through memories, reminiscent of the one in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004).
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind turns the mourning of a breakup into a metaphysical journey, while Seeking a Friend for the End of the World filters romantic longing through the absurd calm of an approaching apocalypse.
The film reminds me of the world-building created in THE TRUMAN SHOW, mixed with the creativity of THE GOOD PLACE, and a hint of ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND.
A movie of big ideas, Eternity recalls the high-concept era of The Truman Show or Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind…
…the cinematography has the unworldly quality of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, turning each snippet of the afterlife into something quietly stunning.
Cunnane’s script borrows themes from similar movies of regret and destiny like “Defending Your Life” and “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.”
…a sky that could have been lifted out of The Truman Show…
The film reminds me of the world-building created in THE TRUMAN SHOW, mixed with the creativity of THE GOOD PLACE, and a hint of ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND.
Folks are checked into hotel rooms in the vast structure looming over the station where backdrops present the illusion of day and night, something like "The Truman Show," and told they have one week to decide…
The result is a grounded yet ethereal comedy that has all the wonder of A Matter of Life and Death and all the playful profundity of The Truman Show.
A movie of big ideas, Eternity recalls the high-concept era of The Truman Show or Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind…
…the impossible love triangle of Casablanca was thrown into the campiest version of The Truman Show…
Desde su premisa, Eternity se ubica en una tradición que va de A Matter of Life and Death (Powell & Pressburger, 1946) a What Dreams May Come (Vincent Ward, 1998), pasando por Ghost (Jerry Zucker, 1990).
It’s all smoke and mirrors, sure, but there’s a certain comfort in a life after death where Patrick Swayze can still spin pottery! “Ghost” is for the lovelorn ceramics obsessives…
Thirty-five years later, “Ghost” (1990) is still the king of these types of movies.
There’s a far more convincing attempt from the Irish writer-director David Freyne with Eternity, an ambitious afterlife romance that could more neatly play alongside films of the era like Heart and Souls, What Dreams May Come and Ghost.
Eternity might not be the renaissance of the romcom, rather a decent resurrection. It follows in the footsteps of films like A Big Bold Beautiful Journey, Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy, Materialists, Picture This and The Wedding Banquet (all 2025 releases), and shows like One Day (2024) and Nobody Wants This (2024–).
From Challengers to Materialists, the love triangle has truly made its comeback, and David Freyne’s delightful romcom Eternity offers a refreshing twist.
Whether it’s a film such as Anyone But You, or Celine Song’s Materialists, audiences are into beautiful people falling in love on the big screen.
That’s awfully shallow for a rom-com in 2025, especially one from the same studio that just this year gave us Celine Song’s brutally honest Materialists.
Sure, this year’s MATERIALISTS would qualify, though it’s a pretty sharp comedic commentary on the current dating scene.
The Summer I Turned Pretty and Materialists made for strong indicators, but Eternity seals it: This has been the year of the unsatisfying love triangle.
Eternity se ubica en una tradición que va de A Matter of Life and Death (Powell & Pressburger, 1946) a What Dreams May Come (Vincent Ward, 1998), pasando por Ghost (Jerry Zucker, 1990).
Did this film do for me what Kore-eda’s After Life, or Nine Days, or even What Dreams May Come did?
…and then there are dramatic riffs on the same premise like What Dreams May Come…
There’s a far more convincing attempt from the Irish writer-director David Freyne with Eternity, an ambitious afterlife romance that could more neatly play alongside films of the era like Heart and Souls, What Dreams May Come and Ghost.
The hotel in which these dead people must wait (or work) for their choice of eternity is the exact kind of celestial bureaucracy we’ve come to expect from most cinematic works about the afterlife (A Matter of Life and Death, Beetlejuice, After Life, Soul, et al.).
“Ghost” is for the lovelorn ceramics obsessives; “Soul” for the jazz lovers; “Beetlejuice” for the freaks.
There have been better afterlife movies (see Pixar’s Soul, 2020)…
As audiences welcome back Scream, Clueless, and the romcom sensibility of My Best Friend’s Wedding, there’s also a renewed curiosity for films that blend fantasy with earnest sentiment.
As we return to the 1990s, with Scream, Clueless, Buffy, Practical Magic, Happy Gilmore and My Best Friend’s Wedding having either returned or set for it, there’s also a broader sense of nostalgia that’s seeing the resurrection of certain genres.
…lo hace con un tono juguetón, casi autoparódico, que recuerda al cine de los 90 que evoca: ese universo de Clueless, Practical Magic o La boda de mi mejor amigo donde el amor y la estética camp convivían con el melodrama.
As audiences welcome back Scream, Clueless, and the romcom sensibility of My Best Friend’s Wedding, there’s also a renewed curiosity for films that blend fantasy with earnest sentiment.
As we return to the 1990s, with Scream, Clueless, Buffy, Practical Magic, Happy Gilmore and My Best Friend’s Wedding having either returned or set for it, there’s also a broader sense of nostalgia that’s seeing the resurrection of certain genres.
…lo hace con un tono juguetón, casi autoparódico, que recuerda al cine de los 90 que evoca: ese universo de Clueless, Practical Magic o La boda de mi mejor amigo donde el amor y la estética camp convivían con el melodrama.
As we return to the 1990s, with Scream, Clueless, Buffy, Practical Magic, Happy Gilmore and My Best Friend’s Wedding having either returned or set for it, there’s also a broader sense of nostalgia that’s seeing the resurrection of certain genres.
…lo hace con un tono juguetón, casi autoparódico, que recuerda al cine de los 90 que evoca: ese universo de Clueless, Practical Magic o La boda de mi mejor amigo donde el amor y la estética camp convivían con el melodrama.
Freyne and co-screenwriter Patrick Cunnane flesh out the afterlife in a way that feels akin to the creation of the mind in Disney's Inside Out, or the afterlife in Beetlejuice.
All of this is in keeping with the storytelling gimmick I refer to as The Factory Behind, in which common human experiences like dreaming or dying are ruled by complex systems and bureaucracies. See “Inside Out,” “Monsters, Inc.” and any number of afterlife movies such as “Heaven Can Wait” or Albert Brooks’ criminally underappreciated “Defending Your Life.”
Turner is playing a “perfect” man, but he’s utterly boring, akin to watching James Marsden in “The Notebook” (2004).
There’s plenty of comparisons to other love stories – namely “The Notebook”…
It follows in the footsteps of films like A Big Bold Beautiful Journey, Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy, Materialists, Picture This and The Wedding Banquet (all 2025 releases), and shows like One Day (2024) and Nobody Wants This (2024–).
…in a year that already subjected filmgoers to “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey.”
…it's a shame this is dropping now as many will compare it to Kogonada's A Big Bold Beautiful Journey from earlier this year.
From Challengers to Materialists, the love triangle has truly made its comeback, and David Freyne’s delightful romcom Eternity offers a refreshing twist.
Let your Challengers flag fly high.
It's also one of the better theatrical romances to come out in a while, acting almost like a post-life Challengers, just with death instead of tennis.
From Here Comes Mr Jordan to Heaven Can Wait, there’s plenty of examples of the latter in classic cinema annals, but not much recently.
There’s no shortage of fantasy gems about afterlife bureaucracy conflicting with true love, including “Here Comes Mr. Jordan” (remade into another classic, “Heaven Can Wait”), the wartime Powell-Pressburger masterpiece “A Matter of Life and Death” and Albert Brooks’ “Defending Your Life.”
As audiences welcome back Scream, Clueless, and the romcom sensibility of My Best Friend’s Wedding, there’s also a renewed curiosity for films that blend fantasy with earnest sentiment.
As we return to the 1990s, with Scream, Clueless, Buffy, Practical Magic, Happy Gilmore and My Best Friend’s Wedding having either returned or set for it, there’s also a broader sense of nostalgia that’s seeing the resurrection of certain genres.
There’s even an amusing irony that it could be conceived as a spiritual sequel to the most famous movie romance of the last 30 years: Titanic. (Remember, Rose went and had a life with children and grandchildren after Jack, but runs right back to the boy she knew for three days in 1912 after she dies.)
You remember the scene at the end of "Titanic," where Rose dies and goes to heaven, and she meets Jack at the ship's staircase as though no time has gone by?
What if, as Titanic suggests, your heart will go on ... and on ... and on?