A Matter of Life and Death (1946)
Neither Heaven nor Earth could keep them apart!
A British wartime aviator who cheats death must argue for his life before a celestial court, hoping to prolong his fledgling romance with an American girl.
In A Matter of Life and Death, consciousness is carried by another substrate — a plane of “celestial courtroom”. The story fights on E8/E9/E10 of the E0–E14 reality ladder, compressing law, love, death, prejudice, afterlife.
Same rung, same subject
Films fighting at the same level of reality, about the same things.
Same subject, different rung
The same preoccupations examined at another scale — one mind versus a nation.
Also bends a rule of reality
Other films that change a standing rule of their world — ranked first by those bending it at the same rung.
Warm Bodies (2013)alters at E6 · same rung · loose
Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (2016)alters at E6 · same rung · loose
Splash (1984)alters at E6 · same rung · loose
Dead Man (1995)alters at E6 · same rung · loose
Practical Magic (1998)alters at E6 · same rung · loose
Children Who Chase Lost Voices (2011)alters at E6 · same rung · looseAlso hides consciousness here
Other films that move a human interior onto the same kind of thing.
Secret of the Wings (2012)consciousness carried elsewhere · seasonal fairy realm
Elemental (2023)consciousness carried elsewhere · elemental metropolis
Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988)consciousness carried elsewhere · toon metropolis
Barbie Fairytopia: Mermaidia (2006)consciousness carried elsewhere · fairy-undersea realm
City of Angels (1998)consciousness carried elsewhere · angelic afterlife
Aladdin (1992)consciousness carried elsewhere · Arabian fantasy kingdomSame subject, different mask
The same preoccupations carried by a different kind of thing — grief told through the dead, an animal, a machine.
Marry My Dead Body (2023)consciousness in the dead · afterlife, love
Just Like Heaven (2005)consciousness in the dead · afterlife, death
Alpha and Omega (2010)consciousness in animals · law, love
The Little Mermaid (1989)consciousness in animals · love, prejudice
The Twilight Saga: Eclipse (2010)consciousness in monsters · love, prejudice
Hotel Transylvania: Transformania (2022)consciousness in monsters · law, prejudice
