When asked by film critic Jonathan Romney whether Lolabelle meant more to her than being merely a pet, Anderson remarked:
It’s a film about empathy.
Lolabelle was a character that was almost pure empathy, so I tried to express that as well as I could.
One could argue that Lolabelle, like the fictitious “Gerty” in “Triomf”, acts as a consoler to Anderson.
No wonder film critic Ty Burr calls the film, a unique, exceptionally touching cinematic tone-poem on the subject of mourning.
Ensuing from this one could ask: do dogs go to heaven or is there an afterlife for dogs?
And as a Buddhist, what does Anderson believe?
Her mourning for Lolabelle is grounded in her Buddhist beliefs and there is a long section devoted to the “bardo”, the Buddhist concept of the waiting period between a person’s lives.
The spirit of the deceased spends 49 days in the bardo, as is mentioned in the Tibetan Book of the Dead.
And other belief systems?
There are varied views even within different faith groups.
Recently Pope Francis told a young boy whose dog has died that paradise is open to all of God’s creatures.
Islam offers no clear answer.
In Islam all souls are eternal, including those of animals.
But in order to get to heaven, or Jannah, beings must be judged by God on Judgement Day, and some Muslim scholars say animals are not judged as humans are.
Buddhism also sees animals as sentient beings like humans, and says that humans can be reborn as animals and animals can be reborn as humans.
So given that, the question of whether or not animals can go to heaven doesn’t really apply to Buddhists.
Humans and animals are all interconnected.
Hinduism also outlines a type of reincarnation, in which a being’s eternal soul, or jiva, is reborn on a different plane after death, continuing until the soul is liberated (moksha).
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