Familiar Touch

Cookbook writer Ruth (Kathleen Chalfont) might be ageing but she still loves whipping things up in her kitchen, carefully preparing a lunch of her favourite from memory. The irony is that while ingredients lists currently remain fresh in her head, other things are quietly slipping away. The identity, for example, of her son Steve (H Jon Benjamin), who she mistakes for a gentleman caller come to whisk her off for a romantic weekend, when in fact his mission is to drive her to an assisted living community, which she previously chose for herself, where she can be better cared for.

The careful navigation of this early scene by writer Sarah Friedland, as Steve half plays along in order to make his mum’s move away from her house less painful, is a hallmark of an approach that favours quiet contemplation over melodrama and is all the better for it. The care home, too, isn’t one of those clinical or harsh places so often depicted in films but rather a naturalistic setting. The credits note that it was made in “collaboration with the residents and staff” of a continuing care community and you can feel the documentary truth underlying the fiction, with many of the supporting cast actual workers at the facility.

A quiet film that encourages you to lean towards it, we watch as Ruth attempts to make sense of her new surroundings. Films about dementia often see moments of confusion amped up to the max, but here, while there is no doubt Ruth is often disturbed by her inability to fully grasp what is happening, it is also presented more benignly. Ruth makes sense of the world around her according to her own set of rules, cautiously bonding with her new care worker Vanessa (Carolyn Michelle) and doctor Brian (Andy McQueen) on a level that also studiously avoids acknowledging their role in her life beyond friendship.

A film that is often playful - a speed dating night is a particular hoot - Friedland also explores ideas of home that stretch well beyond the physical place where we might rest our head at night. Ruth and her experience are at the heart of all this, in a multi-faceted depiction, beautifully navigated by Chalfont, that doesn’t rely on any cheap tricks for emotional connection. Where others, for example, might have had Ruth recognise her son for dramatic emphasis, here when it happens she is on her own, a resurfacing memory that is all the more poignant because she has nobody to share it with at the point of remembrance.

Friedland has a choreography background and it shows in the way the characters physically interact with one another. She also pays attention to textures, from the feel of a favourite jumper to the warmth of sun on skin. The writer/director also zeroes in on the importance of physical contact for Ruth - something concrete in a world that is now full of things that she can’t always grasp. Most of all, Friedland’s depiction shows those who are living with dementia remain active rather than passive, in their own way. Making sense of the world takes effort, and while her version of what’s happening and that of those around her might not always fully tally, Ruth never stops putting the work in or living her life on the best terms she can.