The Life Ahead Review – Use Your Words

The Life Ahead was just alright. It was an interesting concept, but nothing happened. 

What Happens in The Life Ahead?

After stealing from an old lady, a 12-year-old boy named Momo is placed into the care of the very same woman he stole from. Having been taken care of by a doctor for a fair amount of his life and with the doctor wanting a break, Momo is sent to Madame Rosa who has taken care of many children. Little does Momo, who has had a hard life, know that Rosa has had a difficult life due to her being a Holocaust survivor and we see the two begin to bond, though at their first meeting, they do not like one another.

Who Are The Characters in The Life Ahead?

The Life Ahead features many different characters of varying importance. There is Dr. Coen, who is the primary caretaker of Momo before Momo is handed off to Madame Rosa. There are Iosif and Babu, who are children under Madame Rosa’s care. And there is also Lola, Babu’s mother. The important characters in this movie are Momo and Madame Rosa.

Momo is an orphaned child, who turns towards drug dealing on the street to find family. Although Momo can find legal ways of making money and develops personal bonds with those around him, Momo feels lost and finds solace in his illegal job. Madame Rosa, on the other hand, is an Auschwitz survivor. She uses her previous experiences to define the strength of her character. As she grows older, the scars from her past leave their marks.

The Life Ahead Review

The Life Ahead was an okay movie. From the surface, the premise of the movie sounds promising. An at-risk child is put under the wing of an Auschwitz survivor. From there, the two will develop an unlikely bond that shapes each character for the better. This is what the movie was supposed to be.

Instead, the movie lacked any proper direction. The bond between the two leads never really developed and was never really shown throughout the movie. From a viewing perspective, I was able to tell Momo was changing and was bonding with Madame Rosa, but how or why, these questions were never really addressed.

Besides the bond development having no screen time, the backstories of these characters were never developed. Besides knowing that Momo is an orphan and that Madame Rosa survived the Holocaust, this is all the information we were given. As a result, the viewer isn’t able to connect with these characters on screen.

Another issue was the dubbing and subbing of this movie. The native language for this movie was not English, and as a result, the movie was both dubbed and subbed. The main issue with this was that the dubbing and subbing never lined up together. Without these two areas lining up, the serious tone of the movie is taken away and is replaced by the comedic timing of poor dubbing and subbing.

All in all, this movie was just alright. It was an interesting concept, but nothing happened.