“Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house / Not a creature was moving” – except the mousy footsteps of Ruth Everhardt (Blythe Danner), a retired care home administrator who after a long and distinguished career was rewarded, not with a bumper pension pot and a lady of leisure lifestyle, but a diagnosis of dementia, of which she is in the latter stages.

Hence why she was found wandering the streets in the middle of the night with nothing but a nightgown to protect her from a snowstorm. Hence why her daughter Bridget (Hilary Swank) and granddaughter Emma (Taissa Farmiga) flew all the way from California to Chicago. Hence why her son Nick (Michael Shannon) presented his father Bert (Robert Forster) with a prospectus for a “memory care place” which goes by the saccharine name of The Reminiscence Neighbourhood.

What They Had, by first-time writer and director Elizabeth Chomko, picks up the broken pieces and asks: what happens next and who gets to decide? But rather than make the effects of dementia on both the individual and their loved ones the sole focus (like so many recent films, television dramas and plays), where she excels is in exploring the additional struggles faced by each member of the family.

Whether that be Bridget suffocating in a loveless marriage to her “checklist” husband Eddie (Josh Lucas); Nick sleeping in a cellar because his long-term relationship with his childhood sweet and sour heart is more off than on; Emma struggling to escape the straitjacket of her parents’ high expectations; or Bert whose heart like his surname is Everhardt and in denial about the severity of his wife’s condition.

Hardly a hootfest, you’d imagine. But, again, where Chomko impresses is by presenting light and shade, heartbreak and humour, very often in the same frame or phrase. For example, when Emma informs her “dick” of an uncle that “Grandma drunk the holy water”, after a beat he responds, “At least she’s hydrated.” Similarly, Ruth’s giggling realisation that she has been using a stapler as a phone not only sends the room into raptures but draws an equally sarcastic remark from Nick, “It really is pretty hilarious. Life’s just one big riot.”

But the most moving and memorable moment is when Bert swallows his pride and deep disdain for his son’s chosen career as a bar owner – which he had repeatedly dismissed in public as a bartender – by dropping in for a drink. “Do you do a Manhattan?” he asks after an age. “Yes,” Nick’s defensive reply. With silence Bert’s way of placing an order, said drink is patiently mixed and served. And once sipped, his concise praise – in one of the few dialogue-light scenes in an otherwise wordy script – does so much to heal the wounds of their strained relationship: “Damn good Martini, Nicholas.” Damn good movie, Elizabeth.

Director: Elizabeth Chomko
Writer: Elizabeth Chomko
Stars: Hilary Swank, Michael Shannon, Robert Forster
Peter Callaghan
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