Documenting a tough subject
A Kiwi documentary that tackles the big question of how should we live when we are dying is coming to Christchurch early next month.
New Zealand film-maker Gwen Isaac spent four years following Margaret Lee’s journey through motor neuron disease. Where
There is Life tells the story of Margaret, her husband Stephen who cared for her, and their daughter Imogen.
Isaac says the documentary is ‘‘the ultimate grown-up love story’’.
‘‘It really is a love story at its core and the audience hopefully puts themselves into the shoes of Stephen, who steps up in ways that I don’t think many of us would. Margaret is not an easy customer, but a beautiful woman and he did a beautiful thing for her by not putting her in a home. It’s all in the film.’’
Isaac initially funded the film herself after she encountered Margaret Lee at the gym during her ‘‘going away do’’ after her diagnosis. She said she was intrigued by Lee’s story and her attitude towards her terminal illness.
‘‘I was struck by how happy she looked. She was in the moment and I thought that wasn’t the typical way of dealing with this terrible news.’’
Isaac offered to put some footage together for the family and the documentary grew from there into a four-year labour of love.
‘‘They were very open and they were trusting straight from the get-go and I was very lucky. There were times when I was in the room and they would forget that I was there, and that’s what you are aiming for. Not being a voyeur, but you don’t want to manipulate people’s behaviour.’’
The film visits the couple at church, at hospital and in hospice care, but for the most part the film encounters this family at home, as Stephen and Margaret move through their final years together.
‘‘It’s not an easy story but I think the film does end on a hopeful note. Experiences do form us, but they don’t have to crush us. People who are coming along, really with circumstances that are not similar at all, are seeing things that they have gone through and have tested them.’’
Isaac said she had been emboldened by the audience responses.
‘‘A man came up to me at the festival screening and said, ‘I’m a cynical man, but your film moved me’.’’
❚ Where There Is Life is scheduled to screen at Sumner’s Masters Hollywood Cinema from November 8. For more information, see hollywoodcinema.co.nz.