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The Sweet Hereafter, 1997 Atom Egoyan's The Sweet Hereafter The aftermath of the tragedy is achronologically documented through four different narrative perspectives: Mitchell, Dolores, Billy, and Nicole. Egoyan uses non-linearity as a means of exploring the process of grief. The bus accident is almost incidental, an accepted fact that only serves as the catalyst in the film. Inevitably, The Sweet Hereafter is a story of individual survival: the painful, intensely personal struggle to find a reason to continue after a profound loss. We see a glimpse of it in Billy's morning ritual, following his wife's death, of waving to his children while driving behind the school bus. Mitchell continues to accept inopportune collect calls from his incoherent, manipulative daughter, if only to find solace in the knowledge that she is still alive. At the end of the film, it is the idea that life does go on, albeit through new and different rituals, that sustains these characters after their emotional evisceration. The Sweet Hereafter is a truly remarkable film, an elegantly realized, heartbreaking testament to the tenacity of the human spirit. | |
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