The Life Before Her Eyes (2007)

Director:

Vadim Perelman

Writers:

Laura Kasischke (novel)
Emil Stern (screenplay)

Release Date:

15 August 2008 (Italy)

Genre:

Drama | Thriller

Tagline:

Diana's life is not what it seems.

Plot:

A woman's survivor's guilt from a Columbine-like event twenty years ago causes her present-day idyllic life to fall apart.

Plot Keywords:

Based On Novel

Cast

Uma Thurman	...	Diana McFee
Evan Rachel Wood	...	Young Diana
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Sherman Alpert	...	Professor
Eva Amurri	...	Maureen
J.T. Arbogast	...	Male Reporter
Zachary Booth	...	Boy Swimming
Emily Rose Branigan	...	Girl Smoking in Locker Room
Gabrielle Brennan	...	Emma McFee
Jessica Carlson	...	Girl at Shooting
Tom Carney	...	Lecture attendee
Adam Chanler-Berat	...	Ryan Haswhip
Tanner Cohen	...	Nate
Heather Collis	...	Waitress
Peter Conboy	...	Professor attending lecture
Pierce Cravens	...	Teenage Usher
Brett Cullen	...	Paul McFee
Aldous Davidson	...	Student
Jewel Donohue	...	Mother
Brett Epstein	...	Student
Alexander Fagan	...	Student
Phil Gardiner	...	Survivor
Christopher Jon Gombos	...	Briar Hill Police Officer
Susan Graves-McCullough	...	Christine Connell: Survivor
Guy Guglielmi	...	Pedestrian
Oscar Isaac
Kia Jam	...	Doctor
Isabel Keating	...	Maureen's mother
Maggie Lacey	...	Amanda
Paul Lucenti	...	Student in hall
John Magaro	...	Michael Patrick
Seth Michael May	...	Teaching Assistant
Anna Moore	...	Blonde Student (as Anna Renee Moore)
Maria Nazzaro	...	Nun at Catholic School
Evan Neumann	...	Richard Payne
Nathalie Paulding	...	Young Amanda
Craig Pollack	...	Survivor
Molly Price	...	Diana's Mother
Anslem Richardson	...	Policeman
Julia Rusatsky
Sean Schreger	...	Female Student
Ken Sladyk	...	University Professor
Mike Slater	...	Young Tom
Oliver Solomon	...	Detective
Brian M. Wixson	...	Scott Connell

Also Known As:

In Bloom (USA) (pre-release title)
The Life Before Her Eyes (USA) (new title)

MPAA:

Rated R for violent and disturbing content, language and brief drug use.

Runtime:

90 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital | SDDS | DTS

Certification:

Poland:18 | South Korea:18 | USA:R (certificate #43660) | Netherlands:16

Filming Locations:

New Haven, Connecticut, USA

Company:

2929 Productions

An intensely beautiful picture

I had the privilege of seeing this film at its World Premiere this weekend at the Toronto Film Festival. From the very opening sequence, this picture draws you in with its sheer beauty. The cinematography is terrific and at some points even terrifying (in a breath taking way) but what impressed me most was the dialog. Everything seemed so real, which played up every detail to me and made the picture all the more engrossing. Uma Thurman is top notch in this but i believe that Evan Rachel Wood really makes it because honestly, who else could we expect to play the teen angst better than her? The relationship between Eva Amurri's Maureen and Wood's Diana is so realistic in every situation and much of that credit has to go to Emil Stern's adaptation. There are so many themes that run deep throughout this movie, and the ever pressing scare of school shootings makes this hit home really really hard. This is an amazing film that will touch every single emotion and leave you thinking about it for days. Go see this movie whenever you get the chance. It is an intensely beautiful and moving film and most definitely one of the best I have seen so far this year.