There is one fact of life that most of us don’t like to think about, but fact it is, and it applies to every single one of us. That fact is basic, and it is that we’re all going to die. Some die young, some die old, some die alone, and some die in the company of loved ones. The fortunate ones get to die in their own homes, surrounded by friends and family. The not so fortunate spend their last days inside nursing homes and elder care facilities. Not all of those are places of which Lucifer would be proud,, but some are. The sad part is that until we reach the age when a nursing home is suitable for us, most of us completely ignore the suffering that goes on in such places. I find that very ironic given that no one escapes growing old unless they die before they actually become old.
“Man in the Chair” is a film that examines growing old from the perspective of youth. The youth in this case is represented by Cameron Kincaid, played by 18 year old Michael Angarano, whose performance is relaxed and works very well with the veteran stars surrounding him. In the film, Cameron is a high school student who wants to make a movie in order to win a college scholarship. He and his buddy, Murphy (Joshua Boyd), are film buffs who also have a wild streak, leading them to attempt mischief in the form of, for example, stealing a car that they believe was used as “Christine” in the film of the same name.
What drives Cameron and his friend to act out by behaving as delinquents isn’t really addressed in any real sense by the film’s screenplay (written by Michael Schroeder, who also directs the film). So, I’m not really sure what Schroeder was thinking by having Cameron and his friend run afoul of the law on a couple of occasions during the story. To me, the idea of Cameron being some kind of “bad boy” just doesn’t really work here. His parents, mother played by Mimi Kennedy and stereotypical mean step-father by Mitch Pileggi, are not very supportive of his dream, and perhaps to get their attention is why Cameron feels some compulsion to step over the line as it were. But if that is the case, writer Schroeder should have tried to make Cameron’s parents into something other than the more or less cardboard characters we meet in the film.
Cameron’s real passion is direction. He wants to make films, and loves watching old movies as a way of studying the craft. It is while he is in a theater that plays old movies that he meets Flash Madden, a crusty relic of a bygone era, played with élan by Christopher Plummer. Madden was a crewman on many studio pictures back in the day, and lives at a nursing home for retired movie folks, including a hearing impaired sound engineer, an aged and sex-crazed former starlet, and other characters who eventually end up helping Cameron make his movie.
These people live in relative luxury surrounded by a caring and attentive nursing home staff. Juxtaposed against this is the life and residence of Mickey Hopkins, played by the now venerable M. Emmet Walsh, whose performance in the movie is almost heartbreaking. He is pretty much estranged from the only family he has, a daughter, and lives in squalor at a rundown care facility. It is being exposed to the tragedy that is the life of Hopkins, an academy award winning screenwriter, that inspires young Cameron to make his film about nursing home abuse and neglect. He enlists Hopkins to write the film, and the people at Madden’s home are all inspired by the opportunity to work in the medium they love so well, even if it is just for one last time probably.
Robert Wagner appears in the film, still looking handsome and elegant. He plays Taylor Moss, a rich producer who had run off with Flash Madden’s wife when both he and Flash were much younger. Madden harbors some resentment, but his desire to help Cameron allows him to put aside those emotions long enough to ask Moss to help finance Cameron’s film project. Moss agrees and the production is off and running. It is more or less implied that Moss’s guilt pushes him into helping Madden when he might otherwise have said no.
I think the message here is that growing old can be a tragedy, but it can also be liberating. Flash Madden certainly kneels before no false gods, and continues to live his life to the fullest, as minimal as that may be. We can allow our age to overcome us, or we can use the freedom one has in the senior years to do as we please with our lives, knowing that any day could be our last so we might as well enjoy ourselves.
Michael Schroeder’s film, “Man in the Chair,” is heartfelt and earnest, but it really is a fluff piece in terms of taking any real look at nursing home abuses in this country. In typical Hollywood fashion, the horror is mostly glossed over, with the emphasis in the end being more about “happy endings” than about the problems the elderly face every day.
The film has played at several film festivals and will open in USA on Dec. 7th.
By Jim Pappas
Source: http://www.the-trades.com/article.php?id=6015
Forget yourself for others, and others will never forget you.
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