It's appropriate that the Legacy Film Festival on Aging is aging gracefully in its fifth year, having graduated from the Coppola Theater in San Francisco State University and settling in for a run at the New People Cinema. It may even arrive at the Castro someday — after all, the Festival still has its whole life ahead of it. And this year's lineup is star-studded, including Brenda Fricker and Olympia Dukakis in Thom Fitzgerald's 2011Cloudburst, about a lesbian couple who escape from a nursing home in Maine and head to Canada to get married. (It's the only entry with a warning of "Strong Language and Nudity," so get your tickets early!) Already above the 49th parallel are James Cromwell and Canadian national treasure Geneviève Bujold in Michael McGowan's 2012Still Mine, in which a husband battles New Brunswick bureaucrats to build a home for his ailing wife. And if those sound like three-hanky affairs, they pale in comparison to Michael Rossato-Bennett's 2014 documentaryAlive Inside. It looks at the revolutionary discovery that playing Alzheimer's sufferers the beloved jams of their youth on an iPod brings out their memories and personalities more effectively than a $1,000 pharmaceutical drug. By the end, you'll be tapping your feet while smiling through your tears.
Tags: Film
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