Ariana Grande’s short film, titled “Brighter Days Ahead,” was released in March of 2025, featuring songs from the deluxe edition of her seventh studio album, titled “Eternal Sunshine: Brighter Days Ahead.” This short film features a few songs from this album, including “intro: end of the world,” “twilight zone,” “supernatural,” “dandelion,” and “Hampstead.” This film has garnered over 9 million views and won the 2025 MTV VMA awards for Best Long form Video and Video of the Year. 

This short film opens up with Ariana Grande playing an elderly version of a character she previously played in an earlier music video, named Peaches in the song titled “we can’t be friends (wait for your love),” where she visited a memory erasure clinic to erase the memories she once held with a former lover of hers. Now, as an elderly woman, she revisits the clinic in hopes of receiving their memory restoration procedure to revisit some of her past memories. 

Starting from her childhood, she goes through different eras of her life she once lived. She goes from a child surrounded by her loved ones to an adult trying to manage life’s struggles, to her popstar persona, and finally to be “put together again” by her father after being torn up by factors up for interpretation. As Peaches revisits these memories, she embarks on a healing journey where she has to confront and heal the wounds of her past, reconnect with her younger self, and come back home to herself through art. 

This film encapsulates the beauty of life. As Grande elegantly put as she describes the film, “when we’re young, sometimes we want to erase certain things or rewrite certain things that seem painful to us in the moment. But when we grow older, we would do anything to relive those moments and we’re so grateful for them.” In an era that is afraid of aging and losing one’s youth, this film highlights the beauty that arises from going through life, experiencing hardship, and being grateful for the journeys embarked on. 

As Grande notes in her acceptance speech for the Video of the Year VMA: “This project is about the hard work that is healing all different kinds of trauma, and coming home to our young selves and creating safety in our own lives, which is a lifelong process and a daily exercise. If you’re on that journey, please continue onward because I promise there are brighter days ahead.”

Watch the full video here

Contributing Writer: Nysa Syed

Image credit: Photo by Rod Long on Unsplash