Bringing Up the Dead

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Bringing Up the Dead

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By Ben Elliott

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If there's one thing we all share, it's death. No matter where we live, what we earn, or how we vote, we all meet the same end. What happens afterward? Well, that's up for debate.

The cinematic afterlife comes in many forms. Some films, like What Dreams May Come, The Tree of Life, and Coco, show us reunited with loved ones in poetic, expansive realms. Others, like Ghost and The Lovely Bones, keep their heroes in limbo, tying up loose ends before moving on.

The Seventh Seal, 1958

But what if the afterlife is as frustrating as life itself? What if we must navigate the same bureaucratic mess that bogs us down here? This idea fuels a subgenre of funny, philosophical films, from courtroom comedies like A Matter of Life and Death and Defending Your Life to the grungy black comedy of Wristcutters: A Love Story or the existential chess game in Bergman’s The Seventh Seal.

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, 2024

In these films, the afterlife is negotiable. The heroes push back against a moral authority deciding their fate and take on the system that sets out to judge them. These movies can feel cynical at first glance, but they carry an optimistic streak in their rebelliousness: They reject the idea that anyone has the right to say whether or not our lives were “well” lived but ourselves.

It’s a concept that continues to fascinate audiences and filmmakers alike. Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, the sequel to Tim Burton’s Beetlejuice, opens this week at The Triplex, 36 years after the original. Both films feature a vision of the underworld full of waiting rooms, rulebooks, and red tape that are gleefully torn apart by Michael Keaton's titular demon.

There's a comfort in returning to this cinematic version of death. It's a reminder that even while life might feel out of our control, the afterlife is still up for grabs.

Showtimes

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