"To live in this world
you must be able to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and when the time comes to let it go,
to let it go."
-- Mary Oliver (In Backwater Woods)
This film was probably a little too short, but in honoring these ten elderly dogs (starting with 20-year-old Mango, who suffers from dementia) and in hearing brief anecdotes from their owners, Sophy Romvari touches on universal feelings and tugs on the heart. We are all mortal beings who will one day decay and pass away, but to see this process on a compressed timeline for the dogs we're lucky enough to have had in our lives, creatures who are such innocent, faithful souls who simply want to be with us, is devastating, and this film taps into that at a time when owners can see the end coming, and are grappling with their emotions. Despite a topic that might cause the viewer to well up with tears, somehow the film manages to be buoyant, maybe because of an underlying acceptance that this is the natural way of things, and these profound relationships with our dogs are to be celebrated for having happened, not mourned when they're gone.
