Le Monde après nous

I'm happy I didn't listen to the bad reviews here and skipped this movie. It's very well made.

And yes, it raises more questions than it answers, but this is how it would be during an apocalypse or cyber attack. You wouldn't know what's going on and wouldn't trust anyone fully, you could only rely on some bits and pieces of information.

It wasn't boring at all, very engaging actually. The fact that most questions that come to mind when watching it are not answered, leave you thinking about what you would do and even question things in life you take for granted.

This movie is only uncomfortable for those who don't wanna use their imagination and own thoughts and expect a movie to put every answer in their mouths.

I haven't seen such a thought provoking, elegant yet unsettling movie in a long time!

Oh and by the way... the big question everyone has, what's actually going on is answered at the end, just pay attention to the conversation in the car and the computer screen.. It's all there.. What happens after? Well, finally a movie that allows you to use your own thoughts.

A prophetical nightmare about the inevitable consequences of our way of living in the 21st century.

A dysfunctional family with emotionally drained bonds between them, with patterns of social arrogance, mistrust and racism in their relation to another couple, each trapped in a doom-like situation, without a point of return to normal. The way they successfully describe the evolution of a global apocalypse here is disturbing, but absolutely true. It's likely that it won't come with a Big Bang, but with a whimper, a creeping process, which no one is able to understand or control, during everything looks like normal, but under the surface, invisible, everything has already changed with fatal consequences. The occuring events are enigmatic and the uneasiness resulting from that is perfectly shown by camera movements, montage of sequences and sound design.

Nature is out of balance, natural and technical ressources come to an end, our total slavish dependance on digital gadgets makes us vulnerable, a perfect target. Ignorance won't help us out. It's devastating that many of the viewers are already unable to get the crystal clear message of this movie. They prefer to continue, ignore and entertain themselves with stupid sitcoms.

That's what the end is telling us! And that's why they don't get it.

After just a few minutes, we (wife and I) were pulled into the suspense and drama of this movie. For over two hours we followed the tense, taut events with several 'whoa!!' moments.

And then it just ended. With all the effort in building up the complex, intriguing plot, I can see how a definitive ending would be difficult or impossible to create. It felt like rather than make any attempt, they just chose an abrupt, inexplicable stopping point versus an actual ending. Many plot elements were developed and left hanging.

The first two hours I'd rate this an 8 or a 9. The last 10 minutes a 2 at most.

Facing the apocalypse in a unique way is not an easy thing to do in movies, but director/screenwriter Sam Esmail takes Rumaan Alam's 2020 novel and turns it into an unrelenting 2023 psychological thriller that captures the current extremist political landscape and isolationist world view with sharp acuity. No one real is explicitly mentioned, but so much of the threat presented in the spiraling plot felt not only relevant but palpable. It starts with a last-minute family vacation in a Long Island mansion and the two strangers who enter their lives. Julia Roberts plays an unapologetically mistrustful woman with familiar conviction, while Ethan Hawke does what he can as her laid-back husband. As the mysterious stranger, Mahershala Ali has to play it close to the vest, while Kevin Bacon has an effective turn late in the story. I could've done without some of the contrived camera angles and predictable music cues, but overall the film got me thinking what I would do under similar circumstances.

Started out with lots of promise for a thoughtful, tense thriller. But unfortunately that didn't come to pass. And unfortunately the ending didn't make up for the thin soup we were asked to digest for the previous hour and a half.

I can't even say the acting was terrific, because it just seemed so . . . Adequate. And the direction was off and on, with some really good moments but way too many closeups of faces just wordlessly. . . Looking.

Bless them all for trying but it just didn't hold my attention. Although I hung in there until what I hoped would be a revelatory and redeeming ending. But alas, no.