Away from Her (2007)
Directed by Sarah Polley
Fiona and Grant have been married for nearly 50 years. They have to face the fact that Fiona’s absent-mindedness is a symptom of Alzheimer’s disease. She must go to a specialized nursing home, where she slowly forgets Grant and turns her affection to Aubrey, another patient in the home.
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What critics compared Away from Her to
The bastard spawn of Away from Her (2006) and Hereditary (2018) – with a dusting of mutant spores from Mark Danielewski’s 2000 postmodern cult novel, House of Leaves – Relic takes the everyday tribulations of countless families and infuses them with a fresh, darkling resonance.
Whenever Valerie needs a break from her parents, she goes to visit her grandmother (Oscar-nominated legend Julie Christie from "Away from Her," "Finding Neverland" and "Troy").
Nothing about Christie's performance argued otherwise, and this is the perspective of someone who has long cherished her in movies from McCabe & Mrs. Miller right through Away from Her, the film that earned her most recent Oscar nomination.
Her screenplay (a rewrite of a draft by Away From Her director Sarah Polley) draws not only on Louisa May Alcott's beloved 1868 novel but on various other works of the author.
And yet, it never feels completely bothersome to me, which I think is due almost solely to Sarah Polley, one of the greatest English-language actresses working right now (and based on the evidence of Away from Her , one of the most exciting new indie directors to keep watching).
It's good to see Polley back on screen, after her successful turn behind the camera directing 2006's Away From Her .
Sarah Polley, herself nominated for an Academy Award for her screenplay for "Away From Her," plays his ambitious girlfriend, who while working for a biotech company goes rogue and creates her own part-human, part-animal hybrid.
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The other recent Alzheimer’s movies are Bille August ’s “ A Song for Martin ” (2002), Nick Cassavetes ’ “ The Notebook ” (2004), and Erik Van Looy ’s “ The Memory of a Killer ” (2005).
Unlike The Notebook and Iris, Away from Her does not embrace the tear-jerker label.
On the surface, Away from Her bears a resemblance to Nick Cassavete’s treacly The Notebook (2004), since both films deal with husbands trying to break through the wall of lost memory with their wives, but there all similarity ends.
It's like an edgier, literary "The Notebook."
Anyway, that framework provides The Notebook with its only really noteworthy break from cliché, which is to present geriatric love defying mental deterioration in a sweet and supportive light, and even there, it would have its ass handed to it a couple of years later by Away from Her .
Alongside Sarah Polley (Away from Her), Ben tops the list of smashing debuts this year.