Almost a year after being presented during the Venice Mostra, where he was awarded three times, the drama Over low heat is finally playing in our cinemas. For her first feature film, Sarah Friedland decided to take spectators to the life of an octogenarian with cognitive disorders. A sad story that stems from his personal experience.
Among the cinema outings of Wednesday August 13 was included Karate Kids : Legends, The fire test, Is there a cop to save the world et Wishhy world. In the middle of all these outings was also the drama Over low heat de Sarah Friedland. Tripling awarded at the Venice Mostra, the feature plunges us into the life of Ruth Goldman (Kathleen Chalfant, seen in The Affair), an elegant octogenarian, who receives a younger man for lunch. While she thinks of continuing the gallant appointment to a surprise destination, she is led to a medical residence. Carried by an appetite to live insatiable and despite his capricious memory, Ruth appropriates his age, but also his desires.
Over low heat : an acclaimed achievement “Born of both personal and professional experiences”
Over low heat is not taken from a true story, but it is “Born of both personal and professional experiences”as Sarah Friedland said for the press kit of her film. “The first inspiration comes from the relationship with my grandmother who, while I was a teenager, found himself suffering from dementia (…) When it happened, under the blow of the disorder and the sorrow, my family began to talk about her as if she was no longer there. This way of talking about someone who loses her memory is extremely common”she continued. “”However, when I visited her, I found her very expressive on the physical level. She was swinging, she hugged rhythms with her hands, it seemed to me clear that, even if her cognition was modified, this other part of herself was expressed. The gap between this person who was there, just in a different way, and the way in which language described it is an idea that has long haunted me “.
“This work has changed everything I thought about aging”explains Sarah Friedland
Director Sarah Friedland then said that she had drawn her inspiration from a New York sculptor and artists with whom she worked. “I started working as an assistant for a sculptor with dementia, then for more than three years, for other New York artists prey to memory disorders. This work has changed everything I thought about aging and care, especially on age-related identity”.
Article written in collaboration with 6Médias