Getting old is the unavoidable result of living a long life.
Getting older comes along with a great deal of life experience that makes for rich modes of storytelling and a unique perspective on life.
In the United States, aging often means that our older loved ones may move to nursing homes, where they can receive the proper care and socialize with others their age.
On the other hand, films often portray the elderly in retirement communities as bumbling and comedically clueless or depressingly helpless.
Two films from the 1980s, however, tackle this topic using very different artistic lenses.
We can start with Say Anything, a late 80s romantic-comedy written and directed by Cameron Crowe.
The film stars John Cusack in one of his most iconic roles as Lloyd Dobler.
The film focuses on Lloyd's post-high school infatuation with local beauty and class valedictorian, Diane Court.
Diane works at a nursing home owned by her father.
Lloyd, in an effort to spend "as much time as humanly possible" with the admittedly busy Diane, starts volunteering there.
By the end of the film, we discover that Diane's father has been running the nursing home's finances in a less-than-ethical way, which serves to call attention to the mistreatment of the elderly in our society, though the residents themselves are not given much importance in the plot of the film.
In an interesting meta-moment, Lloyd hosts a movie screening at the nursing home and chooses to screen the 1985 sci-fi film, Cocoon, in which nursing homes play an important role.
In the film, elderly residents of a retirement community sneak into a nearby pool in the backyard of a home being rented by aliens disguised as humans.
The pool has been charged with life force and is something of a modern-day fountain of youth, so the residents begin to feel rejuvenated.
The film culminates with the characters forced to choose between traveling to the aliens' home planet of Antarea where they will never age or staying on earth to eventually die.
This film is a welcome example of elderly characters playing a crucial role in the plot of a major motion picture.
Thinking about these two different instances of nursing homes playing an important role in major motion pictures is important because it demonstrates how the 1980s were a time in which our country's attitude toward the elderly was changing.
Now, almost thirty years later, it's crucial that we make an effort to treat the elderly with compassion and respect, and not use nursing homes as some sort of 21st century proverbial ice-float for our loved ones.
Getting older comes along with a great deal of life experience that makes for rich modes of storytelling and a unique perspective on life.
In the United States, aging often means that our older loved ones may move to nursing homes, where they can receive the proper care and socialize with others their age.
On the other hand, films often portray the elderly in retirement communities as bumbling and comedically clueless or depressingly helpless.
Two films from the 1980s, however, tackle this topic using very different artistic lenses.
We can start with Say Anything, a late 80s romantic-comedy written and directed by Cameron Crowe.
The film stars John Cusack in one of his most iconic roles as Lloyd Dobler.
The film focuses on Lloyd's post-high school infatuation with local beauty and class valedictorian, Diane Court.
Diane works at a nursing home owned by her father.
Lloyd, in an effort to spend "as much time as humanly possible" with the admittedly busy Diane, starts volunteering there.
By the end of the film, we discover that Diane's father has been running the nursing home's finances in a less-than-ethical way, which serves to call attention to the mistreatment of the elderly in our society, though the residents themselves are not given much importance in the plot of the film.
In an interesting meta-moment, Lloyd hosts a movie screening at the nursing home and chooses to screen the 1985 sci-fi film, Cocoon, in which nursing homes play an important role.
In the film, elderly residents of a retirement community sneak into a nearby pool in the backyard of a home being rented by aliens disguised as humans.
The pool has been charged with life force and is something of a modern-day fountain of youth, so the residents begin to feel rejuvenated.
The film culminates with the characters forced to choose between traveling to the aliens' home planet of Antarea where they will never age or staying on earth to eventually die.
This film is a welcome example of elderly characters playing a crucial role in the plot of a major motion picture.
Thinking about these two different instances of nursing homes playing an important role in major motion pictures is important because it demonstrates how the 1980s were a time in which our country's attitude toward the elderly was changing.
Now, almost thirty years later, it's crucial that we make an effort to treat the elderly with compassion and respect, and not use nursing homes as some sort of 21st century proverbial ice-float for our loved ones.
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