This is less a documentary than it is Brenda King’s personal diary of her experience during caring for an ailing mother afflicted with Alzheimer’s disease. Shedding conventional documentary technique, the filmmaker makes herself vulnerable – and thereby more accessible – by speaking to us directly. Notwithstanding the devastating changes Alzheimer’s has wrought on her mother, Brenda King maintains a faith in her human essence that is unshakable. Using music composed by her father and hand tinted photographs from the family album, King creates an atmosphere of warmth rarely seen. We are left feeling not bitter but rather joyous at the triumph of a loving family over an otherwise deadly disease. It is a treatment of a difficult subject that is dignified, human and tender, qualities too infrequently associated with television’s usual approach.
- Tags
-