The Life Before This is one of those films most producers would be scared of making and most studios would have no idea how to market, which is a shame. Hollywood needs more movies like this. It is by no means a happy-go-lucky, feel-good, quickly forgotten movie like most crap put out today. It actually makes you think(God forbid!) about the importance of seemingly trivial choices that we make everyday and how much ability we have to unknowingly affect the people around us. Sarah Polley is absolutely amazing in this film, which is pretty par for the course with her, but the other actors are all strong enough to not be overshadowed. Credit should go to the director for switching between and connecting multiple story lines with ease and still making you feel like a really know all of the characters. If you're a fan of big budget, action-laden blockbusters or easy to digest fluff, stay away!!! LBT is an intelligent, eloquent, understated, and disturbing(but not unnecessarily or frivolously) film with all the subtlety and nuance of a Sofia Coppola pic. The acting is superb, the script is superb, the cinematograhpy is superb, everything simply works. This movie will leave you questioning, depressed, disturbed, and moved, and yet despite all this, there is something oddly life affirming about it. Rent it and see for yourself.
