Facing Death – Elisabeth Kubler-Ross (2003/First Run Features)
Picture:
C+ Sound: C+ Extras: D Documentary: B-
A good
basic “deal with death 101” documentary by Stefan Haupt, Facing Death – Elisabeth Kubler-Ross (2003) gives the basic upfront
philosophy of the innovative writer about the state of living including all of
her theories. By taking the stigma from
death added by religion and other superstitious sources, her work has been the
most important since the Existentialist philosophy movement in dealing with the
subject and her influence has reached al the way into pop culture in films like
Alien 3.
This work
does not realize that latter point, but does have interviews, a long
biographical look at the woman and how Of
Death & Dying (1969) became a landmark international hit book. During the course of this documentary, we see
Ross herself in her final years (she passed away on 8/24/04) and further
humanizes the author who did more for humanization (even if you are religious,
which does not necessarily contradict her work) than almost any other writer of
the 20th Century. Her work
lives on and if you have never read her or heard of her, this is a great place
to star.
The
letterboxed 1.78 X 1 image is clean, colorful and not bad for not being
anamorphically enhanced, though we doubt this is an HD shoot. The Dolby Digital 2.0 sound is slightly
stereo, offers captions where necessary (they go to Zurich) and the combination
is engaging enough. Extras include a
Ross bibliography, filmmaker text biography, select Ross quotes and a piece
“About Grief & Bereavement” that will make you want to read more.
- Nicholas Sheffo
