Assisted Suicide in Belgium

A Williams student, Ananya Mayukha, alerted us to an Economist video, 24 and Ready to Die, that focuses on Assisted Suicide Belgique. At 22 minutes, it is well-worth watching.

24 yo subject of Economist film

 This is a moving film that raises n=many questions and does not try to provide facile answers.

Boy Interrupted (2008)

Geoffrey Gilmore, Sundance Festival: Boy Interrupted is a film that raises questions. It asks how a young boy can end his life at the tender age of 15. It struggles to find answers about what kind of family he had and the life he led. By its very nature, it is a naked display of its filmmaker's personal life at its most revealing and perhaps disturbing. How can a mother, we may ask, make a film about the death of her son? What defines this film as a remarkably unique and truth-telling achievement is the way it explores how filmmaking can create closure for its creators as well as its audience.

12/7/13:  Finally got to see this documentary.  It was produced, filmed and directed by the parents of this 15 yo boy who committed suicide.  They are both filmmakers.  Their son purportedly had Bipolar Disease. His paternal uncle committed suicide at age 21. It's an ineffably depressing film, but worth viewing.  I think it's amazing that the parents of this boy felt strongly about making their story accessible. 

The Visitor (2007)

From NetFlix: Widowed professor Walter Vale (Richard Jenkins, in an Oscar-nominated role) finds himself drawn to a different rhythm when he discovers an immigrant couple, Tarek (Haaz Sleiman) and Zainab (Danai Gurira), squatting in his Manhattan flat and becomes wrapped up in their lives. Hiam Abbass co-stars as Tarek's mother, who forges an unlikely connection with Walter when Tarek is thrown into a detention center. 2007 103 minutes Official Web Site and Trailer

Wonderful film about the healing properties of music on a depressed isolated man. Well worth viewing.

Goodbye Solo (2009)

From NetFlix: When Senegalese taxi driver Solo (Souleymane Sy Savane) picks up elderly William (Red West) in Winston-Salem, N.C., the older man hires him for another trip in two weeks. But as they continue to talk, Solo realizes that William plans to kill himself at that time. Befriending his depressed passenger, Solo tries to convince him to change his mind, and an unlikely friendship develops between the two men in this moving indie drama. 2009 91 minutes Trailer.

Director Ramin Bahrani is an Iranian-American cinematographer who grew up in North Carolina.

I saw Goodbye Solo on July 5, 2009. Drove to Albany (45 miles away) and do not regret the trip. It is a powerfully moving story that is hauntingly realistic, gritty and beautifully acted. This is not a Hollywood movie trying to be a blockbuster -- it will appeal to a different audience. Bahrani, an Iranian-American, may have been born and educated in the U.S., but his roots are in a different cinema. This film, in my opinion, is a masterpiece.

The Fisher King (1991)

From NetFlix: Shock-jock Jack Lucas (Jeff Bridges) becomes racked with guilt after a listener takes Jack's tirades to heart, resulting in a bloodbath at a New York City hot spot. Jack sinks into a depression, drinking himself nearly to death and sponging off his girlfriend (Oscar-winner Mercedes Ruehl). When Jack hits bottom, he's ready to end it all. Could a dotty homeless man (Robin Williams) whose wife died in the carnage be Jack's chance for redemption? 1991, 138 minutes.

This film was recommended by Johanna Shapiro, Director, Medical
Humanities Program, UC Irvine

Smart People

Professor Lawrence Wetherhold (DENNIS QUAID) might be imperiously brilliant, monumentally self-possessed and an intellectual giant – but when it comes to solving the conundrums of love and family, he’s as downright flummoxed as the next guy. His teenaged daughter (ELLEN PAGE) is an acid-tongued overachiever who follows all too closely in dad’s misery-loving footsteps, and his adopted, preposterously ne’er- do-well brother (THOMAS HADEN CHURCH) has perfected the art of freeloading. A widower who can’t seem to find passion in anything anymore, not even the Victorian Literature in which he’s an expert, it seems Lawrence is sleepwalking through a very stunted middle age. When his brother shows up unexpectedly for an extended stay at just about the same time as he accidentally encounters his former student Janet (SARAH JESSICA PARKER), the circumstances cause him to stir from his deep, deep freeze, with often comical, sometimes heartbreaking, consequences for himself and everyone around him. 2008 95 minutes