I have watched this movie several times and love it. Why? It begins with Freddy and Ana (20 somethings) traveling on a bus late at night traveling back to their homes. They attempt small talk and Freddy, a comic book illustrator draws a sketch of Ana (nurse returning from vacation). Then, the bus crashes.They wake up in a dark, smoky adaptation of their hometown. No one is around, it seems to be night, and both are very bewildered. The viewers are allowed a peek at their childhoods (which are in color and have people within the scenes). These peeks give much information for the viewer. Once when they were about 10 years old, they brushed shoulders at a local carnival. It is through these scenarios that the viewers are aware that the story they are living in this smoky, abandoned world is partly from Freddy's drawings and Ana's story that she had written as a child. They are going about this town looking for people, trying to figure out where this place is while trying to escape. (Note: Freddy, as a child, drew a comic entitled, The Veil, an obvious but well-hidden hint to their situation.)All the while, this town is being engulfed by a very immense 'smoke storm'. As it comes in contact with parts of the town, the town disappears. Because of this, both Freddy and Ana must find a way back to their 'real' life. They realize they are counting down the hours. Part of the story involves a simple, childish play written by a 10-year old Ana. It is about a knight/prince waging war with this many sharp-toothed, drooling monster. As a result, when acting this play, tragedy strikes. This shows the true relationship of Freddy to Ana.Finally,they do battle the monster and discover how their lives are so involved by fate. They discover how their attitudes and beliefs were shaped by certain misconceptions.Without giving the ending away, I can say that much of the film is symbolic of many things which have happened to both characters. It shows that reality is often not reality - just one's perspective. And, it makes you think about what they really were going through while in this dark town.

Freddy and Ana are just two strangers on a bus when they are suddenly hurtled into a hazy, dreamlike world where it's a race against time to figure out where exactly they are and how to return to the world they once knew. It follows many familiar paths as far as the typical post-apocalyptic genre goes — it's hard not to be bored at times by the lack of originality — but it definitely puts more of a fantasy spin on the trope.I honestly think they drove the romance side of things a little hard. Freddy is interested in Ana pretty much immediately — he's so persistently flirty with her on the bus that I'm almost happy when it crashes. But I'm also someone who is generally annoyed by anything overtly romantic (or sexual) unless it is crucial or somehow beneficial to the plot, which in this case I really don't think it was — I think it just made it a whole lot more cheesy.Their acting definitely left something to be desired, and the script was just so boring that you really couldn't bring yourself to be invested in either of them. There are times when you could basically predict what the next lines would be before the actors would even speak.I did love the wall of blackness surrounding them — it reminded me a lot of "The Nothing" from The Neverending Story. Their efforts to figure out what exactly was happening and how much time they had to escape before they were swallowed whole definitely added some tension.Ultimately, while I didn't dislike the storyline — like I said, it was an interesting fantasy twist on the whole "last people on earth" idea — it just felt like too much was going on at once. I felt like it couldn't decide if it wanted to be post-apocalyptic, a monster movie, a psychological thriller, or if it wanted to try to be some kind of quirky indie romance, and while I don't think it's impossible to combine them all, this particular film just did so poorly. The romance aspect made it way too cutesy and sweet, which I think really distracted from the story and that time and effort could have been spent making it a bit more deep and complex. Not to mention I'm supposed to believe that Ana finds out that Freddy was, in fact, responsible for her aunt's death — something she has been drowning in guilt over for HER ENTIRE LIFE — and then she falls in love with the guy? STAHP.

I just watched the movie After on Netflix. I don't recall having heard anything about it previously, no reviews or anything of the sort. I was pleased with what I saw.It's difficult to discuss the movie without giving anything away and there are other movies with similar premises, but this one was well-executed.Two strangers from the same town meet one another on a bus, with a bit of abbreviated and failed flirtation, shortly before there is a severe accident. The next thing we know they are the only two people apparently alive and active in their town. There are no corpses and no signs of life beyond the two of them. Surrounding the town is a wall of black, swirling mist with lightning and thunder active within it...and the wall is closing in.It doesn't take altogether too long before the two protagonists discuss the possibility that they might both be dead, so they aren't as stupid as the characters in a lot of movies along these lines. We get to know them both pretty well along the way, through surprisingly natural conversation and glimpses into the past, without a lot of unnecessary exposition.I won't go into any further details, you'll need to watch it yourself if you want those, but the acting is good and the production quality is high enough that it doesn't feel like a low budget movie at all. It's always kind of nice to go into watching a movie without any idea what to expect and to be pleasantly surprised.

Two lonely people in the valley of the shadow of death struggle for freedom.Lots of praise for this - acting, pace, and it looks good. A two-hander, with the lead male particularly good, and dialogue excellent in parts. I liked the scene on the bus, and the analysis of the bedroom - "You sleep alone, always on one side, pillow on the other side - keeping your hopes in". Not enough humour, though.Story-wise it's difficult to criticise. A bit sci-fi, a bit allegory, bit psychological, symblogicaltastic. But definitely romance and not a horror, despite the CGI monster. I preferred to see it as a pragmatic pact between doomed depressives, but there was a load of back story suggesting fate brings lovers together, which was confirmed by the swelling strings in the slightly over-cheesed ending. Do individuals seek the one size that fits us all? I guess the answer divides optimists from pessimists. Overall this is Josh Wheedon style.I likesed it, but left feeling a bit confused.