Life During Wartime is the unofficial quasi-follow up to the 1998 film of the same director, perversely named "Happiness". Having said that, I would strongly suggest a viewing of Happiness and Welcome to the Dollhouse (1995) - Solondz first breakthrough, as it contains the back story to most of the characters in LDF. A viewing of these gems will help a viewer unfamiliar with Solondz's fucked-up universe, get a better grasp on some of the themes in his latest picture.
The film picks up a few years after the events which transpired at the end of Happiness. Again we follow Joy, the closest character to a protagonist in this ensemble piece, as she visits her sister Trish, who has moved to Florida with her three kids, well two actually as the oldest is in college up in Oregon. Joy meanwhile is nursing a separation from her troubled ex-con boyfriend and stays with Helen - her too-famous-to-return a phone call ex-poetess-turned-failed-screenwriter sister.
The story unfolds as Trish's youngest son confronts her new lover and asks difficult questions about his real father, who has just been released from prison.
Can we really forgive and forget no matter how hard it is, no matter how horrible the crime? Can people change, even if they are monsters? These are some of the tough questions asked by the characters in this film.
With a stellar cast (although none of the original cast return for reasons beyond this review), dark and morbidly dead-pan dialogue, immaculate use of colour, sound, and composition, Todd Solondz delivers another morbid and at times surreal deadpan tragedy fuses with serious political commentary and a heavy focus on the themes from his prior works to boot - such as forgiveness and the inherently irredeemable deviant nature of certain men.
I am ending this review here because in the end China will take over and none of this will matter.
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