Very Senior - Attitude is everything

There is a place in Arizona that is so peaceful that people go there to die: a retirement community in the middle of the desert, especially designed for senior citizens, with palm trees and bungalows, blue skies, red sunsets, an abundance of pharmacies and extra-wide streets for a comfortable ride in your golf cart!

Seen from Europe, Sun City seems like a utopian vision: a town designed on the drawing board that looks like some extra-terrestrial apparition. And yet, since 1963 it has been routine and everyday reality.

Fun! Fun! Fun! The bright lights flash: there is a punk band in the garage and a tap dance revue on the stage. The old punks call themselves “One Foot in the Grave” and the tap dancers radiate revue charm with undisguised pleasure in what they are doing instead of a perfect figure and blemish-free skin.

Aging is a condition where “aches and pains are part of the deal”, as Jim observes. On the other hand, you have reached a point in your life where you can just shrug and say: “Get over it or take a pill to make you feel good”. At least, that’s what Betty-Jane recommends. Everyone living here has to find his or her own way to deal with life while facing death: if you don’t have much time left, you can choose to make the best out of it. Jim sums it up nonchalantly: “We come to Sun City to die – but to have fun while doing it!”

It’s all about attitude. The residents of Sun City do not subscribe to the view that the last chapter of our lives has to be a solemn one. The town provides a stage on which the protagonists of the film perform the drama of old age as a metaphorical round dance. In telling their stories the residents reveal what they have gained – and lost – from life. They speak openly about the painful side of aging, as well as its pleasures. And they believe that being happy is a decision we can take.

(Quelle: Gluthfilm)