By Amanda Kim
In “Everything Before Us” a feature film by Wong Fu Production, it focuses on two couples that face challenges in their relationships. Relationships are difficult to maintain, and as for Ben and Sara, a couple once that were passionately in love and now broken us, comes together to see if the spark still lives on. As for the other young couple starting off, Seth and Haley are both teenagers who have fell in the puppy love stages and are reluctantly ready to commit in their relationship.
In the future world, when two people are happily in love, they must declare their relationship to the D.E.I (Department of Emotional Integrity). Once they sign up for their relationship, they will be given a score based on their relationship and will later be involved with your everyday life and necessity. The film opens up with two couples, Ben and Sara, and Seth and Haley. Ben and Sara’s relationship status in the beginning are broken up. They each found their own ways and are ready to advance in their career. However, as for Ben, he is unable to land a successful job due to his relationship score with Sara. As for Sara, since her relationship score is stable, she is able to receive a loan to start her business in a café. Due to the issues of landing a job, Ben seeks Sara for help to rise up his relationship score. Although Ben acts selfish at first, he later convinces Sara and they both take a trip to the D.E.I to fix Ben’s problem. Meanwhile, as Ben and Sara resolve their issues, another couple, Seth and Haley, is happily enjoying their relationship. Although their plans of attending college failed, they both figure out a plan to make the time and effort to keep their relationship consistent. Before Haley leaves for college, the couple decides to officiate their relationship and issue to the D.E.I. Once arriving at the D.E.I, they’ve been told that long distance relationships will be a tough challenge and that it’ll take time and effort to keep the relationship alive. Both agreeing on this, they officiate their relationship, and the real challenges began. Once Sara and Ben resolve their issues, they begin to keep their current relationship civil. As they start over and try to become friends, they end up exploring the endless possibilities of why and how their relationship ended. They also begin to open up about the past and reminisce all the great memories they shared. Ben and Sara are both at a great place right now since they’ve matured and evolved into adults. Ben offers Sara to paint a mural for her café. As for Haley and Seth, Seth decides to visit Haley in college every time he has a chance. They both make the time for each other at first, but later it becomes a challenge to live up to the expectation of being in a long distance relationship. Seth and Haley eventually drift apart and they both realize that their idea of a relationship is harder than it seems.
Overall, two themes occur in this film about relationships. In the situation of Ben and Sara, relationships are sometimes given a second chance. Although they didn’t know that their relationship would continue, they both matured and realized that the love they had for each other was still existent. For Ben, Sara was the girl that he loved and was hard to forget. He thought she was just a girl from the past, but in reality, she was the girl that was meant for him in the long run. As for Haley and Seth, the message in this couple was, never rely on forever. Haley and Seth both thought that they would end up forever and be together in the end. Without living with consequences, Haley saw beyond her relationship with Seth and began to live her college life as she matured as well. Although it was hard for Seth, he understood that if you loved someone, you had to ultimately let her go. In the end, for the power of love, Seth sacrificed his relationship points so that Haley can study abroad. At this moment, Seth was the matured on after all; instead of constantly going back to Haley, he freely let her be by letting the relationship be put to rest. However, you ever know, maybe Seth and Haley’s relationship can be a mirrored image in the future of Ben and Sara. In the end, the main message delivers that love is a beautiful emotion that comes with complicated features.
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