Is There Really "Life After Beth"?

Filmmaker Jeff Baena's disaster flick romance is exemplary, even by peak 2014 Zombie apocalypse cinematic standards

In 2020, at the height of the pandemic, a popular song by JP Saxe and co-sung with singer/songwriter Julia Michaels, aptly titled “If the World Was Ending,” was virally making the airwaves. It’s a catchy tune, so catchy that when I took Zoom voice lessons around the same time, this was one of the songs I requested to sing. Likely, I was working through some internalized sadness and anticipatory grief at the reality that we might all die of COVID-19, but the act of acknowledging the fragility of our mortality required expression in some way, and singing was accessible. I sang both Saxe’s and Michael’s parts and didn’t sound as good as them. I thought I did, and I guess that counts.

As I was pondering the tragic suicide of filmmaker Jeff Baena weeks ago, I decided I needed to see his 2014 breakout film, Life After Beth [Trailer], starring his wife and creative partner-in-film, Aubrey Plaza. Baena’s death affected me in deeper ways than I’d anticipated. It could have been the lull of post-New Year and January’s resting state of “Depress Mode,” beckoning, but the fact that both Baena and I were born in the same year, Jewish, film lovers, and pretty deep feelers also struck me as a point of profound similarity.

Sandwiched between millennials and Gen Xers, and technically, both Xers, likely our friends (and, in Baena’s case, romantic partner), are mid-to-older millennials/Cuspers. We’re not quite old enough to be bonafide Xers with cachet but often bear the cynicism and tell-it-like-is snarkiness of an Xer. We’re the “lost sub-generation” (apologies to Gertrude Stein; may she rest in peace for the bastardization of this term). By default, I’d assert that puts us on shaky, uncertain ground and probably explains our being drawn to darker fare and curiosity around all things existential, such as mortality and, of course, Aubrey Plaza.

Oh, and zombies, because yes, I love zombies. In the ethereal dance between breath and stillness, the ability to reveal a deep cosmic dialogue that whispers of existence beyond the mortal veil is rich. Life and death intertwine like delicate, luminous threads. It’s alluring.

Simply put, Life After Beth has zombies, moving and affecting scenes, a workable story arc, and comedic top brass, such as Paul Reiser, Molly Shannon, John C. Reilly and, may he rest in peace, Gary Marshall. This was his last film appearance.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

Dane DeHaan and Aubrey Plaza are lovers who just can’t quit each other in “Life After Beth.”

Spoilers ahead in this section. Scroll down to “In Closing” to avoid plot details.

The Story

College-aged Zach (Dane DeHaan) learns his girlfriend Beth (Aubrey Plaza) has died from a venomous snake bite while hiking alone. He’s despondent and seeks the company of Beth’s parents, Maury and Geenie, played by John C. Reilly and Molly Shannon. One day, shortly after the funeral, Zach, who senses he’s being ignored by Beth’s parents all of a sudden, goes to visit them at their home, where he glimpses Beth in the window. Both Maury and Geenie try to conceal Beth from Zach, afraid Zach’s knowledge might jeopardize Beth’s teetering existence, but Zach confronts them and her. It turns out Beth has risen from the dead as a zombie, but she’s also a vampire since she blisters in the sun. [Ear Worm Interruption] The two resume their romance. While prior to her death, there were fissures in their relationship, they take full advantage of their second chance at love, experiencing a renewed passion that only the threat of loss can ignite.

Zach’s parents, Judy (Cheryl Hines) and Noah (Paul Reiser), are concerned about his mental state as he starts talking about seeing Beth again. They think he’s stuck in a loop, unable to properly grieve, and so Judy sets him up with Anna Kendrick’s character. As the story progresses, Beth becomes slightly more unhinged and devolves entirely into a flesh-eating zombie. Zach fears for his life, as do Beth’s parents. After Zach explains to Beth that she’s no longer living, she goes postal. Along with this crisis, all of the dead, including Zach’s grandparents, come back to life as flesh-eating zombies and threaten humanity. The movie shifts gears and becomes about survival. Ultimately, though, it’s about how we hold on to love and the lengths we go to to preserve the memory of someone dear to us. It’s oddly touching for a film that could, in the hands of any other director, be reduced to just another zombie apocalypse film. The fact that Baena could recruit such comedic and serious talent for this work while leveraging their skills to tell such a quiet and stirring story about resilience is what strikes me. It seems like a small film of the surface, and yet it’s anything but like many of the quieter indie films of the mid-to-late 90s and early aughts.

Zach and Beth float in her pool after dark

How can I be dead, Zach, if I’m alive? You can’t be both things. You can either be dead or alive, and I’m alive. - Beth

In Closing…

While it's natural to analyze an artist's work retrospectively through the lens of their personal struggles, Baena's film stands on its own merits. Life After Beth, like the popular refrain of Cher's song “Believe,” demonstrates that there is life after love (and the death of a loved one) and that it doesn’t have to be so bleak. 

Baena’s legacy as a filmmaker is one of perceptive storytelling and a keen eye for the nuances of human relationships, particularly in times of stress or uncertainty. While we won’t benefit from any future work from Baena, we have the films he’s left behind. I look forward to watching Horse Girl (2020) with Allison Brie, which tackles weightier subjects of mental illness because, in Baena’s hands, I trust the nuanced topic will be thoughtfully held and carefully exacted to effect. Perhaps, now, in lieu of his death, it takes on another dimension of understanding, as well. Maybe it won’t hit the high notes as mixed reviews indicate, but I have confidence it will experiment in a bold and humanistic way that transcends life and death. The emotional resonance of a “deep feeler” filmmaker will be present and, no doubt will move audiences by examining universal truths of the human experience, however painful.

Rabbit Hole Excursion

Interview with Jeff Baena on Life After Beth

His words on the film’s story:

Yeah, it was always a relationship. it was always a guy's girlfriend dies and then comes back unexpectedly or without any reason and then trying to make it work again.

Baena on the set of “Horse Girl”