Director and writer Dan Fogelman, creator of the groundbreaking series “This Is Us,” takes a poignant and expansive look at love, family, tragedy, joy and fate in “Life Itself.” In the Fogelman weaves a multigenerational story that celebrates life as well as, in a weird way, death, set to a soundtrack inspired by Bob Dylan’s landmark album Time Out of Mind.
“Life Itself” follows college sweethearts Will (Oscar Isaac) and Abby (Olivia Wilde) as they fall in love, get married and prepare to bring their first child into the world. As their story unfolds, fate will link them to Dylan (Olivia Cooke), a troubled young woman trying to find a way out of her pain, Irwin (Mandy Patinkin), bringing up his son’s daughter in a perilous world, to Mr. Saccione (Antonio Banderas), a moneyed landowner in Spain, his plantation manager Javier (Sergio Peris- Mencheta) and Javier’s family, Isabelle (Laia Costa) and Rodrigo (Alex Monner), in ways large and small, ordinary and exceptional.
With a star-studded cast and settings that range from the crowded streets of Manhattan to sunbathed olive groves in the Spanish countryside, “Life Itself” asks us to question our assumptions about luck and misfortune, about triumph and tragedy, and ultimately about life itself.
“Life Itself” is now in cinemas.