After All tells a family story. Directed by Kerstin Karlhuber, this touching indie drama looks at three generations of women in a Texas family. They’ve suffered various fractures and traumas over the generations, and now they have to figure out how to come together.

After All looks at a number of things that can scar and damage a family. Mental illness, violent men, lost children, alcohol, and trying to escape it all. We learn the current situation as it weaves together seamlessly with scenes from the past.

Penelope Ann Miller plays Verna, the grandmother. Her daughter Ellen (Erika Christensen) lives in Austin in the kind of life where not a single thing works right. Ellen is the mother of Haley (Kiara Muhammad), a mixed race teen who has a pair of mean girl bullies. Verna is raising Haley, not Ellen.

Verna has a stroke. She lives through it and physically is fine. But mentally she’s lost a lot. She loses of track of who is who, she’s childish and impulsive, she forgets how to do things. She needs daily care.

Haley wants to do it, but she’s in school. Ellen does not want to do it, but her options are limited. She tries her aunt (Jennifer Griffin), who can’t do it. Ellen wants to put her mother in a nursing home which causes a revolt.

In the process of sticking around to figure out what to do with her mother, Ellen spends time with her mother and her daughter. Which leads to conversations, arguments, and eventually to understanding.

There is good use of flashbacks to Ellen’s father Walter (David James Elliott), her older brother Lenny (Austin P. McKenzie) and other lost family members. Ellen’s old boyfriend Bobby (Zach Gilford) still lives in the town.

The film is relationship drama fit together like a puzzle. Secrets and memories weave together with trauma and loss until finally the three generations of women come to understand and appreciate each other better.

I give this one a strong rating. You can find it streaming on Tubi, The Roku Channel and Fawesome.