“Lives Well Lived” is a low budget, locally made documentary that I personally got the chance of seeing at the San Luis Obispo Film Festival. I’d heard the title of the film beforehand, but knew nothing of its content, so I was going in nearly as blind as possible; I’m glad I did.
The documentary is a series of interviews with people aged 75-100, about the life they’ve lived, what advice they’d give younger people, what advice they personally took, and, as the title asks, what really is a ‘life well lived?’. What was extremely unique about the doc is that it was made from a local filmmaker, and I recognized many of the interviewees she talked to; one actually living just a few short blocks from my house. The film was a series of inspiring and interesting interviews with local local elders, along with out of state ones as well. What really captured my attention was the fact that each one of these people had lived fascinating and successful lives, but there was not a general consensus on how to get there; some of them had suggested that young people need to ‘work less, enjoy more,’ whereas another bunch had based their lives upon a strong work ethic and job consistency. It really shows you that each person’s version of success is different, and can be achieved through different way.
But, like nearly every movie in existence, there were some negatives; luckily for this one, though, the negatives are only based on editing errors, rather than actual content. Truly the only negative I really noticed was the somewhat abrupt transitions between interviews and historical clips; it didn’t happen for every interviewee, but it certainly happened for a few. Along with this insignificant error, the movie also ended on a somewhat awkward place. I won’t fault the film too hard for this, though, I mean how are you really supposed to end a film based entirely upon interviews?
“Lives Well Lived” is a fascinating locally made documentary about the wisdom of elders and the stories they have to share. To get info on when you can check the film out, click here.
My Rating: 8.5/10.
