End Game

This documentary packs a powerful blow in unmasking death. I've sat through two hospices deaths: my aunt and my dad. I found going to and from the hospice's incredibly difficult. Being with my dying loved ones wasn't, but the trip to them felt like a sledge hammer was hitting my heart. It was a relief to let both go, even though at the time I didn't feel that. I felt as we all do a desperate clinging to have them back if only for seconds. Since I've found peace to accept memories are all I have left - and that is enough. Hoping for miracles carries a heavy emotional price-tag thats not easy to put into words or even pictures - but this documentary does a superb job.

Treasure life. It always feels like its gone too quickly.

Wonderful job filming the reality with patients and one family in particular. The doctor talks about how he had to face grief himself in his own body, and this gave him the strength and the inspiration to help other human beings look at this huge mystery, to look at the "end (of the) game", the end of life itself. A gem of documentary showing vulnerability as the ultimate strength.

I am very fresh from grieving three loses in my family. Two of those from cancer. This documentary touches on the realities of the disease and i felt some sort of relief in understanding the last moments which unfortunately i was unable to see of my own relatives.

Its very tastefully delivered and answers some questions about loss and death itself.

What a beautiful piece. Which made "The end game" seem like the start of a new journey.

This poignant documentary by Rod Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman follows the lives of people with terminal illnesses in San Francisco, California. Each one is consulted by hospital staff to try a new way of dealing with their situation, some are led to the Zen Project runned by Dr. Miller, who had a near death at age 19.I

This film tries to show their non traditional methods, separating it from a traditional hospice situation. But one story stands out is Mirta, an Iranian woman dealing with Cancer. It's such a sad situation of her relationship with her family, and their struggles to Mirta's possible mortality. She is offered the way of the Zen Project and other surgeries.

In the end, each person is shown on how they dealing with their terminal medical condition, as they deal with understanding death as a human process.

Over the years, Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman have made documentaries usually focusing on LGBT topics (Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt, The Celluloid Closet, State of Pride, etc)*. With the Academy Award-nominated "End Game", they look at a different topic: death. This production focuses on palliative care, forcing the viewer to think differently about death. After all, it's a topic that we try to avoid, but it will eventually happen to every one of us.

Serious but calm, the documentary is one that every person should see.

*Without Friedman, Epstein directed "The Times of Harvey Milk", a documentary about the assassinated gay politician.