https://www.imdb.com/list/ls064861637/). It seems that Hollywood has been churning out film after film about life after life. For the sake of brevity, I’ve 86ed 73 of them and give you a cool baker’s dozen that would make a terrific Afterlife Film Festival. We’d need to find some heavenly place on our planet to screen a collection of such divine cinematic treats.
1. “Always” (1989), the Steven Spielberg romantic drama starring Richard Dreyfuss and Holly Hunter, is a remake of the 1943 “A Guy Named Joe.” In it, Dreyfuss, an expert pilot, makes one last flight against the wishes of his girlfriend (Hunter), and dies in a fiery blaze. His spirit, however, now has a divine purpose: to guide new pilots psychically. Half a year after his death, he finds himself guiding the pilot who has just fallen in love with Hunter, who has finally overcome her mourning.
2. “Defending your Life” (1991) is an Albert Brooks comedy that stars Brooks and Meryl Streep in an afterlife life review. This is without a doubt one of the funniest films about the hereafter you’ll ever see.
3. “After Life” (2009) is an Agnieszka Wojtowicz film starring Liam Neeson as a funeral director who can hear the dead, and who helps the deceased make their transitions.
4. “Heaven Can Wait” (1978) stars Warren Beatty, Julie Christie and James Mason under Beatty/Buck Henry combo direction. Beatty portrays a football player who’s inadvertently taken up to Heaven before his time, and then persuades an afterlife guide (Mason as Mr. Jordan) to give him another body to play football again. This is a delicious remake of the 1941 “Here Comes Mr. Jordan,” in which the lead character was a prizefighter.
5. “Ghost” (1990) stars Patrick Swayze, Demi Moore and Whoopi Goldberg in a romcom directed by Jerry Zucker. After Swayze is murdered, his spirit hangs around his still-alive lover (Moore) to protect her from his killer. Goldberg is the reluctant psychic, one of the wackiest channels in cinematic history.
6. “Ghost Town” (2008) under David Koepp’s direction, stars Ricky Gervais as an acerbic man who’s revived after being dead for a few minutes, but winds up seeing ghosts everywhere he goes.
7. “Ghostbusters” (1984) is Ivan Reitman’s supernatural comedy, starring Bill Murray and Dan Aykroyd as ex-parapsychology professors who take on the task of removing ghosts from people and places.
8. “The Five People you Meet in Heaven” (2004) stars Jon Voight and Ellen Burstyn in Lloyd Kramer’s film about a dead amusement park worker, who must confront a handful of people to bring peace to his troubled soul.
9. “Topper” (1937) is a supernatural comedy starring Cary Grant and Constance Bennett as antic ghosts communicating with a living being, Cosmo Tipper (Roland Young). The film, directed by Norman McLeod, served as the inspiration for a successful sitcom that aired from 1953- 55.
10. “Beetlejuice” (1988), Tim Burton’s eerie comedy, features Michael Keaton, Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis as ghosts who aim to dissuade the new inhabitants of their home from moving in.
11. “The Sixth Sense” (1999), M. Night Shyamalan’s supernatural horror film, stars Bruce Willis, a recently deceased psychologist, and Haley Joel Osment, a young boy who “sees dead people,” and helps Willis adjust to the afterlife.
12. “City of Angels” (1998) stars Nicolas Cage (an angel) and Meg Ryan (the mortal he falls in love with) under Brad Silberling’s direction, in a remake of Wim Wenders’ “Wings of Desire.”
13. “Field of Dreams” (1989) stars Kevin Costner under Phil Alden Robinson’s direction in this mystical baseball picture, in which deceased ballplayers come back to Earth to play on an Iowa cornfield-turned diamond that only spiritually awakened people can see.
