The plot revolves around a woman's survivor's guilt from a Columbine-like event that occurred 15 years previously, which causes her present-day idyllic life to fall apart.

While awaiting the final days of high school in the lush springtime, Diana tests her limits with sex and drugs as her more conservative friend Maureen watches with concern.

She smiles and walks inside, first leaving flowers on some desks and then moving on to the rest rooms where one of the shootings took place.

At that moment she gets a call from Emma's school informing her that her daughter is missing and that a pink piece of clothing has been found in the woods.

What occurred 15 years earlier in the washroom where Diana left the flowers is revealed: She and Maureen had been forced to decide who would survive when confronted by the shooter, Michael Patrick.

The critics consensus reads: "Despite earnest performances, Life Before Her Eyes is a confusing, painfully overwrought melodrama.

[4][5][6][7][8] Joe Goldsmith of IndieWire called the film "a reasonably well made, if hopelessly overblown melodrama, which oversteps its mark with pretensions of narrative complexity and social currency".

[1][4][9][10] The Philadelphia Inquirer's Steven Rea wrote, "There are two very fine performances here - Wood's and Amurri's - but they're not strong enough to rise above the metaphor-laden script.

[1][4][9] The Los Angeles Times's Carina Chocano wrote "though [the film] hints at some interesting thematic elements, Perelman doesn't delve into them very deeply.