Is there a life after death? Dragonfly delves into the very depths of ones beliefs and pushes us to the edge of the supernatural. There were many instances where my hair stood on end at the bizarre things that took place in the movie.
Dr. Joe Darrow(Kevin Costner) is the head of emergency services for Chicago Memorial Hospital and well respected for his expertise in the trauma room.Tragedy befalls him when his beloved wife Emily (Susanna Thomson) is killed when the bus she is travelling in falls into a ravine on a remote mountain road in Venezuela.
An oncologist by profession, it comes to light, in the course of the movie, that Emily was pregnant at the time of her death. This double loss for Joe takes a heavy toll on his professional life and his superiors vainly persuade him to take a long vacation.
Long and torturous months after Emilys tragic death, Joe is reminded of her in various forms. The foremost being the dragonflies that she had all over the house in some form or the other. Creepy becomes eerie when Joe decides to stop waiting for Emily to come home and begins to pack her clothes away. A fused light takes him away from the room for a few minutes. On his return, he is shaken by the sight of his wifes clothes rearranged neatly in the wardrobe! Eerie gets eerier (if there is such a word) when ’’Big Bird’’, (their old and aging parrot, who would neve speak to anyone but Emily and say only these words ’’Honey, I’m home’’)goes berserk one evening and screams ’’Honey, I’m home’’.
Dragonflies appear mysteriously and Emily oncology patients speak to Joe as though they know him (though they had never seen him let alone met him). They bring back messages from Emily when they have near-death experiences. As the signs get more and more urgent and frequent, Joe seeks out Sister Madeleine who was researching the near-death experiences at the hospital.
Is Emily alive? Why is he seeing her image everywhere? What is the strange symbol that keeps appearing in the childrens’ drawings, on the window sill in the mist, in the fallen mud, everywhere...What is she trying to tell him? What is the message that she so urgently and obviously needs to give him?
I could go on and on with the details of the movie but I will spare you that unnecessary tirade.The movie is slow and likely to send you into splitting yawns. Not for the action movie lovers.Terribly slow though there is something happening in every scene in the movie.Also, guaranteed to send a shiver down your spine what with all the super-supernatural happenings taking place in the movie.Joe Darrow is naturally the main character of the movie and his performace is, as always, par excellence. The music is quite haunting.
I thought the basis of the movie was ridiculous and please don’t tell me I have no faith. The movie has nothing to do with faith, just ghosts and the supernatural.And Dragonflies.