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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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Bringing the law to the gerontological stage
— a different look at movies and old age | | Author(s) | Israel Doron |
| Journal title | International Journal of Aging and Human Development, vol 62, no 3, 2006 |
| Pages | pp 237-254 |
| Source | http://baywood.com |
| Keywords | Cinema [entertainment] ; Ageing process ; Attitudes to the old of general public ; Law. |
| Annotation | Films often portray the complexities of real-life ageing issues, showing how the are apparently handled outside of and around the law or legal issues. In an attempt to better understand these issues, this article deconstructs five relatively modern and well-known films: Driving Miss Daisy; Waking Ned Devine; On Golden Pond; The Straight Story; and Iris and John. All feature aged protagonists, and all tell their stories against a background of legal issues that are only alluded to, and remain hidden "behind the scenes". This analysis asks two main questions. First, to what extent does the reality of old age as described in the films considered reflect familiar social phenomena identified by empirical studies? Second, to what extent does the legal infrastructure embedded in the narrative of these films reflect the legal regulations that govern older people in nowadays? The conclusions arising from the analysis of cinematic and legal reality expressed in the films demonstrate that the current level of discourse on major issues in social gerontology ignores the importance and relevance of law. It thus behoves us to "bring the law to the gerontological stage" where the current situation as it actually exists can be analysed and perhaps even be changed. (RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-060608204 A |
| Classmark | HMF: BG: TOB: VR |
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing |
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| ...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing. |
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