IMDb > The Sweet Hereafter (1997)
The Sweet Hereafter
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The Sweet Hereafter (1997) More at IMDbPro »

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The Sweet Hereafter (1997) -- post

Overview

User Rating:
7.8/10   15,353 votes
MOVIEmeter: ?
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Director:
Atom Egoyan
Writers:
Russell Banks (novel)
Atom Egoyan (screenplay)
Contact:
View company contact information for The Sweet Hereafter on IMDbPro.
Release Date:
21 November 1997 (USA) more
Genre:
Drama more
Tagline:
There is no such thing as the simple truth.
Plot:
This film documents the effects of a tragic bus accident on the population of a small town. full summary | add synopsis
Plot Keywords:
more
Awards:
Nominated for 2 Oscars. Another 29 wins & 20 nominations more
NewsDesk:
(28 articles)
This Week In DVD: October 13th
 (From FilmSchoolRejects. 13 October 2009, 11:56 AM, PDT)

Tiff Picks 09: Atom Egoyan's Chloe
 (From ioncinema. 7 September 2009)

User Comments:
Bus Plunge more (174 total)

Cast

  (Cast overview, first billed only)
Create a character page for: ?

Additional Details

Also Known As:
De beaux lendemains (Canada: French title)
more
MPAA:
Rated R for sexuality and some language.
Runtime:
112 min
Country:
Canada
Language:
English
Color:
Color
Aspect Ratio:
2.35 : 1 more
Sound Mix:
Dolby Digital

Fun Stuff

Trivia:
Donald Sutherland was originally cast as Mitchell Stephens, but had to back out and was replaced by Ian Holm at the last minute. more
Goofs:
Audio/visual unsynchronized: When Stephens visits the Ottos, and Mr. Otto offers him some tea, we hear a teakettle whistling but the one we see on the cooker is not the whistling type. more
Quotes:
Mitchell Stephens: Something's happening that's taking our children away. more
Soundtrack:
Boy more

FAQ

This FAQ is empty. Add the first question.
29 out of 36 people found the following comment useful.
Bus Plunge, 11 November 2004
Author: garella from anywhere everywhere

Atom Egoyan's The Sweet Hereafter is a drama of loss and internal conflict within and among the people of small town which has lost its children to a winter bus crash. The central figure is Mitchell Stephens (Ian Holm), a lawyer who comes to the town in the hope of putting together a lawsuit on behalf of the surviving families.

Egoyan drags bitter and emotional performances out of his excellent cast, and managed to make me fall in love with a group of characters who, on the surface, are less than appealing. Every major character in his adaptation of Russel Banks' novel is morally bifurcated and riven with doubt.

Particularly interesting from a social perspective is the treatment of Stephens' mission. I thought the lawyer's efforts to put together his suit were played even-handedly, somewhere between the greed of an ambulance-chaser cynically exploiting a local tragedy and the difficult but necessary effort to use a flawed legal system to achieve a kind of justice. But the friends who saw it with me saw Stephens strictly as a "slimeball," placed there to test and tempt the struggling townspeople. If that's the impression that most viewers get, then I'm disappointed.

Whatever your perspective on that social question, there's no denying the slow power of this film. It moves with the measured fascination of inevitability, and leaves you with a bitterness you can savor.

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What is the meaning behind the incest scene? dark_j11
F-ing terrible bara0401
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So why did the bus crash??? caitlinette
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