First Take: Being old & feisty doesn’t mean behaving like senile juvenile delinquents

Sooraj Barjatya’s Uunchai gets the life of autumnal people in such a clichéd clasp it makes the characters gasp for breath. Coincidentally I saw a very quirky very funny and original Israeli film My Neighbour Adolf about two very old crotchety men who bond over chess and suspicion: Polsky, a holocaust survivor played with unnerving crankiness and petulance by Scottish actor David Hayman, thinks his new neighbour is Hitler… No, not a copy but the real chap who butchered millions because he didn’t like them, period.

Now Polsky doesn’t like his neighbour either. He rants, rages and protests against what he sees as Hitler in the house next door when the neighbour played by Udo Kier insists he is not Hitler.

After a while the joke about Hitler wears thin and we get the same Tom & Jerry antics from different angles, speaking of which the cinematography by Radek Ladczuk is first-rate capturing the countryside in postcard idyllic perfection that contrasts with the aberrations in the quaint homes. The two ageing actors give so much to their characters that it’s like watching two heavyweight champions thrown into a lightweight clash.

Alex Lehmann’s Paddleton is a masterly meditation on mortality, it is a lot of things at the same time. But the one thing that it avoids being is over-sentimental, let alone schmaltzy, as two lifelong buddies, neighbours who are far more comfortable sharing silences pizzas and campy kungfu films than the stuff that friends do in onscreen bromances, realise that one of them has to go.

Netflix’s offering is a silent stunner because it doesn’t try to stun. It is a stinging indictment of buddy flicks. The genre is turned on its head as the friends come to terms with the looming reality of mortality. One of them Michael (Mark Duplass) is going to die. My immediate concern after the opening (where a female doctor breaks the news in a scene so casual it seemed written on the spot) was not for Michael but his friend Andy (Ray Romano). What is he going to do after Michael is gone? Neither of the two friends says much about what will happen, or what has happened before. But they mean the world to each other. And no, they aren’t gay.I don’t think they are much into conversations. And the only reason why they are now talking more than usual is because we the audience, are around.

When was the last time you saw a film about friendship and dying where soaring background music and a roaring drama were not a staple? In Paddleton, the conversations between the two friends are so unfiltered and unedited, I felt I was eavesdropping. Michael and Andy have reached that stage of their bonding where words just come in the way. Just hanging out together, not making an effort at conversation is all they need to do. There is just one sequence of confession of feelings for one friend from another in the entire film and it comes at a time when little can be done about it.

For those who think it’s never too late to express one’s feelings, Paddleton is an eye-opener. It’s always too late to express love. Words can never capture the essence of an imperishable relationship. Both the primary actors are beyond the definitions of actable brilliancy. Romano and Duplass live every moment of the death that stalks them from the moment we join them on screen.“I am the guy who is dying,” Michael reminds Andy as the latter tries keep the euthanasia medicines away from him.“I am the other guy,” Andy shouts back in a rare display of public outburst.

To call Paddleton a celebration of dying would be endorsing the macabre. This matter-of-fact head-on-the-shoulder tearless (almost) weepie walks that thin strong line between life and death allowing the latter to finally win, but only by default. The film never stops teasing death. In one of the most tantalising moments just when Michael is assisted in his death by Andy Michael wonders if he can connect with his friend from the other world if there is such a provision. I was laughing and crying at the same time. Sometimes losing the one you love the most, becomes a process of reevaluating your life and counting the blessings. Paddleton makes us think about life and death and friendship and loyalty and loneliness and euthanasia without getting breathless. It is a film of remarkable restraint during a time of unmitigated tragedy. It isn’t afraid to display emotions. But it isn’t asking us to cry about death either.

It’s not easy to watch someone you love fade in front of you. Harry MacQueen’s Supernova is not an easy film to watch. It brings us so close to love, life, death and regret that we feel the full force of all four emotions, like those waves undulating on those panoramic British shores that Sam and Tusker drive through.

Sam and Tusker, pianist and writer, have been lovers and companions for more than twenty years. Time is now running out on their till-death-do-us-part togetherness. Tusker (Stanley Tucci) has been diagnosed with dementia. Before he forgets everyone and everything, or, as Tusker puts it, forgets who is the one forgetting, Tusker wants to end his life.

The realization that no matter how close you are to someone you may still not know him well enough hits Sam hard. He takes it badly. And since Sam is played by the redoubtable Colin Firth (if you have seen his range, from Mama Mia to The King’s Speech you would know he can play anything, from manic depressive to gay) his seething rage at not being able to control the creeping progression of mortality into his love, is so palpable I felt it at the pit of my stomach.

Sam’s fading partner is played by another brilliant actor Stanley Tucci whom you may not have noticed. He has this habit of creeping into characters and disappearing into them completely. Here, Tucci’s Tusker is stubborn, witty, wise and dying. Though he is the wife in the homosexual partnership he is what you may call the dominant partner. Tusker’s helplessness at not being able to ensure that Sam won’t fall apart after the tragedy overtakes their love is not what you will see through cinematic tropes (maudlin background music, dramatic expressions of rage and grief, etc). None of the usual signposts of tragedy here. It’s all done with seamless fluency, making every moment between the lovers-companions precious without punctuation, eternal without prompting.

On the surface, Supernova is a road film about two people in love trying to come to terms with a looming tragedy. Underneath there simmers great wisdom and truth about human relationships. No matter how indelible and profound, death will conquer the heart.

I came away from Supernova a better human being. The film is not “directed” to showcase the talents of two British stalwarts. It is every inch a treatise on the finality of love and the finiteness of feelings no matter how deep. I love the way the family-reunion episode has been shot, Sam’s family. But it’s Tusker who seems to warm up to them and to bond with every member of Sam’s family as though there is no tomorrow (there isn’t).

During a quiet moment away from the family bustle Tusker turns to Sam’s brother and asks, “You will look after him, won’t you?”

That’s the moment when my heart broke.

Subhash K Jha is a Patna-based film critic who has been writing about Bollywood for long enough to know the industry inside out. He tweets at @SubhashK_Jha.

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