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Dementia/Alzheimer’s

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03Sep

Alzheimer’s: What You Can Do (Part 1 of 2)

The presentation method and level of depth of Alzheimer’s: What You Can Do seem designed for general audiences seeking an update on recent treatment trends for AD and, perhaps, some encouraging news regarding progress in delaying or curing the disease.
01Sep

Determined: Fighting Alzheimer’s

Determined: Fighting Alzheimer’s introduces us to a remarkable and dynamic longitudinal study begun in 2001 that tracks a community-based sample of adult children with parents diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease (AD).
31Oct

Alzheimer’s: What You Can Do (Part 2 of 2)

Alzheimer’s: What You Can Do presents a lifestyle treatment model designed to reduce multiple personal risk factors correlated with the development of Alzheimer’s disease (AD).
21Jun

Lousy: Love in the Time of Dementia

This brief, thoughtful, and intriguing video by Frank Silverstein shares 3 years of visits with his parents, Joe and Lynn Silverstein, as they age-in-place in their home.
01Feb

The Father (reviewed by Jim Vanden Bosch)

Nearly all the reviews of The Father in mainstream publications are enthralled with the film’s attempt to see dementia from the inside out—that is, from within the mind of the person experiencing dementia.
01Feb

The Father (reviewed by Rose Capp, PhD)

In the course of his seminal work in the dementia care field, Tom Kitwood noted that it was impossible “ … to enter fully into the experiential frame of another person, simply because each person is unique” (Kitwood, 1997, p. 71). Kitwood went on to observe that stepping into and describing the world of someone living with dementia, particularly in the more advanced stages, involved additional complexities, given that first-person accounts typically describe the early stages of dementia.
01Feb

The Father (reviewed by Cyndy Hunt Luzinski, MS,RN)

After Anthony Hopkins won the 2021 Oscar for best actor in The Father, our Dementia Together team viewed the film and found it creatively compelling and hopelessly heart-breaking—everything the cultural “tragedy narrative” around dementia would have us believe is inevitable and true.
16Sep

Life in Stills

The themes of memory, love, and loss that are central to Angel’s Perch are also found in the documentary film, Life in Stills , but with a different mixture. The grandmother–grandson relationship in this film is of an entirely different character than that presented in Angel’s Perch .
14Sep

Old People Driving: A Film About the End of the Road

Shaleece Haas’s award-winning short video, Old People Driving, is a charming film. This video focuses on two very old, cognitively intact men—Haas’s 96-year-old grandfather, Milton, and 99-year-old Herbert. The choice of Milton and Herbert signals a useful view into our future, as ranks of drivers aged 85 and older are swelling with the population aging of the oldest old.
19Mar

Elizabeth is Missing

The opening scenes in Elizabeth Is Missing are a master class in concise character development.
11Nov

The Mole Agent

Have you ever wished to be a “fly on the wall” in a residential care facility so you could observe the kind of care being given to a family member, or just to see the kind of dynamic being played out between residents and staff? Watching The Mole Agent will give you a sense of what that would be like.
29Mar

Head Full of Honey

Many contemporary films that deal with dementia focus on the role of the caregiver and the complex issues involved in supporting a family member living with dementia. Head Full of Honey falls into this category, but is unusual in having a youthful protagonist in the central caring role.
11Mar

The Story of Shadow and Light: Giving Voice to an Alzheimer’s Journey

Who would have thought that the experience of living with Alzheimer’s could be set to music? In Eugene, Oregon a music conductor, Diane Retallack, having experienced two generations of dementia in her family, knew that there could be great value in bringing a musically artistic expression to that experience.
11Feb

Alive Inside: Reprise

Perhaps the greatest power of documentary film is its ability to reveal to us experiences, feelings, and events that might have otherwise remained beyond our awareness and our imagination. Two years ago in this space ( Scheidt, 2013 ), I reviewed a brief version of “Alive Inside,” a video by Michael Rossato-Bennett.
31Jan

You See Me

The premise of this interesting and multilayered film is revealed at the outset: Videographer Linda Brown created You See Me (http://youseememovie.com/) in hopes of achieving a better understanding of her father, Stanley Brown, a man she loved but “wonder if I ever really knew.”
Movies About Aging and Elderhood