No matter what your belief is about the afterlife, there’s always this hope that the ones we love will be there waiting for us. But in Eternity, we get a look at a different perspective when it comes to the afterlife – and what happens if more than one past love is waiting for you.
The movies main focus is Joan (Elizabeth Olsen), who after she passes finds that not one of her former husbands is in the afterlife waiting for her, but two. While the story surrounds Joan and her choice of who to spend her eternity with, it really spends the beginning setting up the story with Larry (Miles Teller) her second husband who passes away shortly before her. Larry finds himself in the afterlife and realizes it’s not what he was told at all, and he could choose an eternity of his own or would be forced to work while he waited for Joan. Every soul has one week to decide what they want to do, and when Larry finally makes a choice and is about to leave, he sees Joan and changes his plans. What he doesn’t expect is her first husband has been waiting for her for over sixty years, and now the decision between the two men and what her eternity is is all Joan’s hands.
The movies is funny in the right way, irreverent in others and will make you stop and think along the way. What would you do if a spouse you loved waited that long for you and your life and love continued to grow through the years with someone else? What is the right choice and what is fair? Do you choose love, or do you run away and choose yourself? For a movie that makes jokes throughout the whole run time, it’s actually pretty deep and at the heart of it has a sweet love story (or two).
Eternity is a rom-com of a different sort. It’s funny, poignant, tragic and heartfelt all at the same time. There’s something bittersweet about wanting to find your own happiness and being able to choose where you end up with in the rest of your life. It allows for the personal choice of the individual but also brings in the religious desires of others as well. And while the movie doesn’t say that there is one true religion, it does allow each of the souls to choose what is best for them, and not focusing on the wants and desires of everyone else from their lives. And that, is simply beautiful when you think about it. No right, or wrong. Just the individual choice and dreams for the rest of their souls existence.
The movie makes you think, while still gives you a break from reality while enjoying it. Eternity is now playing in theaters everywhere.
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About Eternity
In an afterlife where souls have one week to decide where to spend eternity, Joan (Elizabeth Olsen) is faced with the impossible choice between the man she spent her life with (Miles Teller) and her first love (Callum Turner), who died young and has waited decades for her to arrive.