The Sweet Hereafter (1997)

Did you people see the same film I saw?

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

I've seen this movie a few times and I believe Nicole is sexually involved with Billy Ansel as well as her father. The clue comes if you watch her clothes. When she leaves the baby sitting she is wearing a skirt and a blue sweater. When Billy Ansel arrives back with the headlights shining on Nicole she is wearing blue jeans. That puts Billy in the house when Nicole changes clothes and in the scene showing her changing she is in the bedroom and Billy's ex wife's clothes are sitting on the bed. Either the shining head lights scene is a goof (Nicole wearing the wrong clothes) or this is a hay maker I have never seen in a movie before. Up until now I thought the clothes changing scene was before Billy came back. If this was intended and not a goof this film is about a 15 out of 10 and the best film ever made by far and probably the best mystery also. Am I the only person who got this?

In a small town in British Columbia, a school bus skids into a lake, killing several children. Their grieving parents are approached by a lawyer, Mitchell Stephens (Ian Holm), who is haunted by his dysfunctional relationship with his drug-addicted daughter.First of all, well played to Sarah Polley, who not only sings but also has to be paralyzed. She never seems to have gotten the full respect she deserves, and in many circles is best known for the "Dawn of the Dead" remake. She is so much more than that.And Ian Holm is a powerful lead. Apparently Donald Sutherland was the first choice but it ended up in Holm's lap. Sutherland is one of my favorite actors, but I think Holm has a sense of gravitas that Sutherland does not. So, with all due respect, this was the right call.This is widely considered one of the greatest Canadian films of all time. That is a tall claim, but who am I to argue with the critics?

The Sweet Hereafter is 1997 Canadian drama movie based on a novel by Russell Banks of the same name. The screen play is written and directed by critically acclaimed director Atom Egoyon . The Film stars Ian Holm, Sarah Polly, Bruce Greenwood, AlbertaWatson, Simon Baker, Marc Donato, Broke Johnson, Maury Chaykin, Stephanie Morgenstern, Carthain Banks, Tom MeCamus, Russell Banks (cameo) and Gabrielle Rose. The Sweet Hereafter tells the story of a horrible school bus crashing accident that killed numerous local children. Their shattered and grieving parents are approached by a lawyer Mitchell Stevens (Ian Holm) who is hunted by the problems of his own, he wants them to file a class action lawsuit to sue for the damages by claiming the bus was faulty. Some of the parents at first are unwilling but they are persuaded by Mitchel Stevens that suing for damages is the right thing to do, some parents shows interest only because of the big settlement and some parents just want justice to be done.As most of the children are dead the case mainly depends only on 3 people that witnessed the accident, the bus driver Dolores Driscoll (Gabrielle Rose), Nicole Burnell (Sarah Polly) who was sitting at the front of the bus and who is now paralyzed below the waist because of the bus crashing accident and Billy (Bruce Greenwood) who was following the bus. Dolores Driscoll is willing to help to prove it wasn't her fault, Nicole Burnell is reluctant at first but agrees to help only on a condition that she wouldn't lie but Billy who lost 2 kids in the accident is against the lawsuit and tries to convince other parents to drop the lawsuit but nobody listens to him and tells him to stay out of it. In the pretrial deposition, Nicole Burnell lies and accuses the bus driver Dolores Driscoll of over speeding and thus causing the accident. After doing so all the hopes of suing the bus company with the possibility of big settlement disappears. The intention behind Nicole's lie is to punish her father who was sexually abusing her before the crash. Everybody that suffered from the accident or those who are involved in the case knows that Nicole is lying but nothing can be done and the trial never takes place.The story of the movie unfolds in non chronological order it jumps back and forth from one plot to another many times and loses the momentum. At first it was OK but after a while it was hard to watch because it never focused on the main story. In start we are introduced to several characters and each character has a story of its own. There are many different events besides the crash, which distracts the attention from the main plot. Mitchell Stevens daughter Zoe is a drug addict and she hates her father but its never explained what she hates him for also by the end of the movie Zoe tests positive for a blood test and its not explained what the test was for aids, pregnancy or something else. Also Zoe at first is shown as a homeless druggie but by the end she is well dressed. Billy has an affair with Risa (Alberta Watson) who is married to Windol (Maury Chaykin) but its never told why Risa is cheating on Windol or why can't she just leave him if she doesn't love him. Billy has also lost 2 kids in the accident but he is against the lawsuit because he knows it was just an accident and according to him it's wrong to sue for the damages but isn't it wrong to have an affair with a married woman? In the start of the movie its shown that Nicole loves her father (Sam MeCamus) and that they have a nice father daughter relationship but halfway its shown that Nicole is sexually abused by her father and by the end of the movie its shown that she hates him and therefor in order to punish him she lies and accuses an innocent person for the bus crash. Dolores Driscoll is held responsible for the accident because of over speeding but at the end of the movie she is back to driving some kind of airport passenger bus, how can she be hired just after two years for driving again when she is held responsible for the bus crash. Even the movie poster is taken from a scene that has nothing to do with the main plot of the movie.Ian Holm as Mitchel Stevens is a bit over dramatic at times but overall he plays the character nicely. Sarah Polly as Nicole Burnell does justice to her character and changes her facial expressions from a sweet to a serious bitter teen. Bruce Greenwood as Billy is convening, apart from Ion Holm, Sarah Polly and Bruce Greenwood all other actors are flat and plain and no one seems to be convincing enough in their respective characters.Atom Egoyon screenplay is too weak and confusing, he fails in directing The Sweet hereafter, he doesn't uses the right tone and right timing to introduce the characters and unfolds the story in non chronological order which only confuses the audience with all those subplots, The only good thing about his directing is choosing the beautiful locations for shoot. Cinematography is beautifully done by Paul Sarossy.Almost all of the main characters have a story, which is never explained, their personal stories are never given the depth they needed. I hardly see any place for those untold personal stories in the movie but they are introduced which drags the attention from the main plot and half way through the movie I didn't care for the accident and just wanted the movie to finish.

***SPOILERS*** We know right from the start where the film " The Sweet Hereafter" is headed in ambulance or school bus chasing shyster lawyer Mitchell Stevens, Ian Holm, on his way to this snowy little town in British Columbia Canada. Stevens is trying to get the people involved in a fatal school bus accident to help him start a class action suite against the bus company the bus driver as well as the town, Sam Dent, in what happened there. We also see that Stevens has problems of his own in that his teenage daughter Zoe,Caerthan Banks, is heavily into the drug scene and is later in the film found to be HIV or AIDS positive because of her non-stop drug use. It soon becomes obvious that Stevens in having his life screwed up, his wife also walked out on him, wants to help others like the school bus survivors and their families more then making any money for his services. It doesn't take to long for Stevens to find out that his services are no longer needed in that by him suing everyone or every thing in sight he's in fact opening up wounds in the community that have just started to begin healing. Wounds far more hurtful then what the people in Sam Dent have already suffered which in fact they were compensated for by the school bus company and despite it not being found responsible, for any shabby work on the road and guardrail,town.At first we dislike Stevens in his obsessive attempt to get the people in town to help him with his class action suit that many don't want to pursue. But later he turns out to be a victim of his own self righteousness in seeing he's going to hurt a lot of Innocent people with his suite who suffered , by surviving, even more then the victims whom he's to represent. One of them is the school bus driver Dorloes Driscoll, Gabriella Rose, who did everything to avoid her bus from skidding into a frozen lake and now has to live with the 14 children who ended up drowning in it on her conscience. There's also 15 year old Nicole Burnell, Sarah Polley, who survived the accident but ended up like the little boy in the story of "The Pide Piper of Hamlin", a favorite of hers, crippled and prevented from entering the land of "Good & Plenty" that the piper was taking the children of Hamlin to.***SPOILERS*** Slow moving but extremely heart wrenching film that has no happy ending which in fact makes it one cut above the usual Hollywood schmaltz were used to watching about the subject matter that it presents to us. A lot like the movie released the year before in 1996 "Before and After" the film "The Sweet Hereafter" shows us how one survives a tragedy like losing a child with both dignity as well as grace instead of vengeance and self-guilt. Besides Nicole the film centers around Billy Hansel, Bruce Greenwood, the mechanic who serviced the school bus and knew that there was nothing wrong with it. Billy also lost his two children who were on the school bus that he witnessed, by driving behind it, crashing into the lake drowning them and their dozen or so classmate. For all the suffering that Billy and the rest of the people in Sam Dent went through he didn't want some shyster lawyer to make, excuse the pun, a killing off it!***MAJOR SPOILER** In the end Stevens also lost a child, his daughter Zoe, through drug abuse and realized the only thing he can do now is try to put that tragic loss behind him like Billy as well as the crippled Nicole were doing and go on with his shattered life. It was Nicole who in her trying to put an end to the lawsuit that Stevens was pushing ended the whole affair by making up a preposterous story about the event,in Nicole being a star whiteness, that had it thrown out of court. Which allowed the healing process that Stevens tried to disrupt to continue and thus make things better for her as well as Mitchell Stevens and everyone else involved.