Rosemarie Blank shows how someone can deteriorate at the end of life in a film about the last phase of her partner’s life. “This was our last project together.”
He would prefer to die. Michael Hellgardt suffers from tinnitus, his hands are fused with arthritis and rheumatism, and he suffers from general rickety. “I’ll stop eating,” he shouts. And then, pointing to the camera with his crooked hands, “Did you record that?” The next moment we see how the elderly man is munching on a cake in a cafe.
The woman behind the camera is Rosemarie Blank, filmmaker and Golden Calf winner with the 1994 film “Crossing Borders”. When the health of her life partner Michael Hellgardt deteriorated, she turned on the camera. With his approval, although he probably had no idea it was going to be such a poignant documentary. “Punt uit” was previously seen in the movie theaters and tonight at the VPRO on NPO 2.
Why she decided to film his decline? There were various reasons for this, she explains in her messy but cozy studio in an Amsterdam incubator with a view of the IJ. It was explicitly not intended to make a documentary about euthanasia. She did want to show the struggle in the final phase of life. “The conflict of wanting to, but not being able to live anymore.” The social debate about euthanasia in the Netherlands is already well developed in comparison with other countries, says Blank. The fact that people nowadays can think about whether they still want to live is a contemporary problem. Hellgardt’s statement “I want to live, but not like this,” illustrates the complexity of choosing voluntary end of life.
It was also a way of slowly saying goodbye to him, says Blank. “Filming him allowed me to see him as we interacted in the best of times. He had humor and put his situation into perspective with jokes until the end. He was also a real bon vivant and could, for example, really enjoy food. And he was very primary in his emotions and quite stubborn. ”
Blank also wanted to show the contrast between Hellgardt’s death wish and the everyday things in life. How he listens to classical music and happily eats spring rolls in the Muziekgebouw aan het IJ, but moments later emotionally blackmails her again with his threat to take his own life.
Almost merciless
The portrait that Blank made of her partner is very sincere and that is special at a time when people on social media mainly show their positive sides. It was certainly not the intention to make the situation more beautiful or uglier, she says.
For example, she films almost mercilessly how, with great difficulty, she gets him back to bed after he falls and cannot get up on his own. She is pulling at his naked body when he shouts that someone else has to come and help. It sounds like a command: “Now a second man must come from the other side”. This irritates her: “Michael, it is nighttime, we are alone here”. She fretfully urges him to push himself up with his skinny legs: “Up, I can’t go on anymore. And now you slide down again. ”
There was no preconceived plan and not even a script or script. That is impossible with such a process, says Blank. The film covers a period of about a year and at the end she had a collection of images from which she constructed the film. In doing so, the story unfolded itself. With her many years of experience as a filmmaker, she almost turned the images into paintings. “I also rediscovered the beautiful Dutch light.” She catches him like a real Rembrandt in chiaroscuro while cutting his hair. The distance the camera created also made it easier for her to put things into perspective, she says.
Not a voyeur
They spent a lifetime together. After the budding of their love in the late 1960s, they traveled through Europe together. He was an architect who doubted whether he would prefer to be a painter. She started out as a visual artist, but since 1982 has made about seventeen films. They have no children, but shared a passion for work, travel, food and life itself. “Actually, we have had a permanent dialogue.” She was involved in his work and he was involved in hers. “This was our last project together. It was a good way to say goodbye. ” That was important to him too, says Blank, because it also gave him the feeling that he was more than a helpless patient. “He really wanted to be a full partner.”
Hellgardt was aware that he was being filmed. “He wanted to keep control of his life until the very end and gave me the freedom to create the images, so I didn’t have to feel like a voyeur,” says Blank. He was the actor who played himself and she was the director. It was their project together, but ultimately her movie.
Blank has been a widow since January 2018, but has no intention of giving up. “I may be old, but I don’t feel that at all.” She is still at work, just back from her home in Tuscany and is currently working on a German version of Punt Uit, which will be released there under the title “Abschied ohne Ende” (Farewell without end).
“Of course I miss him and our life together. Now even more than when I made the movie. His use of language, for example, the way he said things. Very precise and direct … That inspired me when making the film. ”
Also read:
Michael Hellgardt wants to die, but also wants to listen to Bach one more time
Reviewer Belinda van de Graaf previously gave the film four stars. “The result is an intimate and heartbreaking testimony of a man who associates his life pain with a death wish, but at the same time clings to life.”
