Away From Her

This film staring Julie Christie (a rare appearance from that megastar of the 1960s) and Gordon Pinsent, set in Canada, concerns the effects of memory loss on a couple married for several decades and 'never apart'. Fiona (Julie Christie) begins to realise that the occasional forgetfulness is becoming rather more serious.

She puts the frying pan in the fridge, forgets words, doesn't know where she is and generally becomes vague. After studying the inevitable steady decline and realising the stress it will impose on her husband she decides to admit herself into a nursing home. Pinsent is 'not allowed' to visit her for the first 30 days - 'to allow the patient to become acclimatised). He is horrified to see the effect the nursing home has on Fiona. Quickly she has no idea who he is, or of most of their past life together. She latches onto a fellow patient and Pinsent seeks out the man's wife (played brilliantly by one of my favourite actresses Olympia Dukakis) for illumination.

A movie that deals with one of the great fears of those of us entering old age, probably needs to be slow paced, but this film is almost catatonic. It misses the target, and the characters are too stereotypical - the overbearing administrator, the caring chief nurse, the over the to patients. Christie's performance is admirable, but it doesn't really raise this movie to a great level. My rating: 6/10