This review is part of Blitz’s continued coverage of the 71st Sydney Film Festival, 5-16 June. Read the rest of our reviews here.  

---

Matthias Glasner’s Dying (2024) feels a little like Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinertjoins’ Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022), with both telling a heartwarming contemporary family story, creating a symphony of emotions as you are taken on a journey through life in a multigenerational dysfunctional family. Dying makes you consider the profound influences of every individual in your life, as you contemplate how you should communicate with your ageing family and loved ones, while you still can.  

The film centres on inseparable human emotions and the fine chasm between the dying and the living. 

“There is a realm between the living and the dead. What unites them is love.”  

Via FILMGRAB 

The film follows Tom Lunies as he navigates the chaos and indignities of life: dealing with the progressive cognitive decline of his father (Gerd), the complexities of fatherhood when his ex girlfriend wants him to co-parent the child fathered by another man, and managing suffocating workplace demands when he clashes with his talented but increasingly unstable friend (Bernard), who composed the music dying, the piece Tom is conducting. To review this film as merely making me reconsider living, though, would not entirely do it justice.  

Divided into several parts, the film begins through the eyes of Lissy Lunies, Tom’s mum. Amid moments of comedic brilliance, like stopping more than 20m ahead of a child crossing the road with Gerd directing and Lissy driving, lies a sobering undertone of the strain in their marriage as Gerd battles Parkinson's Disease, functional decline, and no longer remembers his wife. After Gerd dies, the mother and son interaction becomes increasingly suffocating, as Tom learns truths about his family and growing up years that leave him never looking at things the same way. These scenes, though seemingly foreign, evoke a strange familiarity, even in families that appear completely functional, normal and free of problems. Any individual wouldn’t help but relate to a certain degree of dissonance within their closest relationships.  

 

      Via FILMGRAB 

The story gradually transitions to Tom’s younger sister, Ellen, a character who jumps out as a strikingly young, naive, barely put-together dental assistant. From little details like Ellen yearning for just one more alcoholic drink to her frenzied affair with a married colleague, this is one crazy ride of a life of unbridled hedonism. A scene that left a particularly strong impression was at the cremation of her mum, where Ellen’s response to her brother as he told her about the inheritance mum left for her was met with indifference, with a cigarette in one hand as she drove off.  

Meanwhile, on the other side of things, Tom receives a call from his friend Bernard on Christmas day, as he pleads for the help of his friend Tom to spare his partner of her grief when she returns home as Bernard decides that he will die today. In the processing of a best friend’s death, Tom respectfully conducts Bernard’s final edition of the composition. As he looks upon the orchestra with a blazing display of bravura, he erupts into a grin, feeling the spirit of the music dying come alive through each musician’s craft, drawing rousing applause.  

“To best understand this piece you need to feel like dying. It needs to be conducted, dying.” 

        Via FILMGRAB 

This film leaves an almost frustrating ache in my chest with the realization that death awaits everyone, yet the worthiness of life seems too often far out of reach. If only Tom’s turbulent personal life was more unhinged and crazily idiosyncratic, perhaps it would have been easier to detach yourself from his character. I found myself treading the careful waters of dark humour and tragedy as I gladly welcomed provocative ideas of stability and havoc in a mundane family life.  

          Via FILMGRAB 

Dying is a confronting, multilayered masterpiece for the desperate and hopeful alike, that life has lots worth living for, despite the jarring harsh realities around us. There is still time for purposeful conversations, authentic love and reconciled relationships.  

Choose to fight for the living. While I don’t wish catastrophe on my worst enemies, perhaps a jolt to our semblance of normality would do us all benefit in the long run. Don’t you think so?  

---

Esther Chua is a third-year student studying Medicine. In her rather limited free time outside of work, you’d probably find her exploring new hiking trails, trying new cooking recipes, or sipping tea over a thought-provoking read.  

---