Starring: Elizabeth Olsen, Miles Teller, Callum Turner, Da’Wayne Joy Randolph, John Early
Director: David Freyne
Rating: ★★★.5
There’s a wave of nostalgia brewing in Hollywood — not just in the return of familiar ’90s titles, but in the revival of a certain type of filmmaking that once defined the era: glossy, high-concept studio romances with emotional stakes as grandiose as their premises. As the audience welcomes back scream, no newsand romcom sensibilities my best friend’s WeddingThere is also a renewed interest in films that blend true emotion with fantasy. that spirit is very much alive eternityDavid Frayn’s ambitious afterlife love story that feels like it could have been performed in front of a packed theater in 1998. It’s a great turn — passionate, funny, visually sophisticated — and an attempt at something many filmmakers have shied away from recently: believing wholeheartedly in love.
The film begins with Larry (Miles Teller) who suddenly dies and finds himself reborn in his younger form in The Junction – a retro convention-center-style organ where newly dead people return to the age when they were happiest and must choose a reincarnated world to live in forever. With his afterlife consultant Anna (Da’Wayne Joy Randolph) guiding him through options ranging from a beach world to a queer world to a completely by-the-book man-free world, Larry refuses to make a decision until his wife Joan (Elizabeth Olsen) returns to Earth, dying of cancer. But when she reaches The Junction and returns to her youth, she is welcomed not only by Larry, but also by her first husband Luke (Callum Turner), who died in the Korean War and has been waiting for her for decades. With only one week to choose, Joan must decide who she wants to spend eternity with – the passionate love she has lost or the imperfect but stable partnership that shaped her life.
Good
David Frain’s world-building is sharp and inventive, turning bureaucracy and metaphysics into something witty, bright, and emotionally loaded. The concept is irresistible – a classic love triangle reimagined as an existential dilemma – and the film handles its scale with surprising grace. David blends the sophisticated sentimentality of 90s studio romance with the fantastical expanse of 40s Hollywood, while filtering it through a contemporary and gently quirky perspective.
Demonstrations support the imagination. Elizabeth subtly portrays Joan’s suffering, playing a woman struggling with identity, longing and exhaustion beneath a youthful exterior. Miles, as always, is quietly moving and unexpectedly charming, playing an unglamorous husband who suddenly realizes that eternity is not guaranteed. And Callum shines with old-school matinee magnetism, while Randolph and John Early bring comic acuity without diluting the emotional stakes.
bad
The final act doesn’t quite reach the emotional climax it builds towards. The film becomes more seduced by the complexity of its mechanics rather than the heartbreak at its center, and a much-teased reveal for Randolph fails to materialize. The repetition surrounding Joan’s indecision slows the pace a bit, softening what probably should have been a devastating punch.
Decision
Despite its soft landing, Eternity is a rare thing today: a big-hearted, original studio romance that risks emotion, scale, and honesty. Beautifully conceived, cleverly written and brimming with emotion, it is an ode to love in all its contradictions – the one we dream about, the one we grow through, and the one that defines us after life ends. A thoughtful, inspiring reminder of a type of filmmaking we might finally be ready to revisit.