I think your whole life shows in your face and you should be proud of that.

–Lauren Bacall

The idea is to die young as late as possible.

–Ashley Montagu

What do screen ac­tors Dame Judi Dench, Robert Duvall, Hal Holbrook, Peter O’Toole, Christopher Plum­mer, and Gena Rowlands have in common? They’re all older than 75, still working hard at their craft, and garnering leading film roles, not just courtesy cameos. Sir Michael Caine (age 78), Morgan Free­man (74) and Charlotte Rampling (65) each have four films currently in the works, and Ms. Dench has seven. (I’m not counting voice-only projects.)

Among film directors, Sidney Lumet, until his death in April at age 86, had still been at work, as are Clint Eastwood (81), Jean-Luc Godard (80) and Woody Allen (75), though first prize here must go to Portuguese filmmaker Manoel de Oliveira, now 102 years old. His last film was completed a year or two ago, and he currently has another in production. Like the population in general, more people in the film industry are living and work­ing longer than many of their forebears.

The flip side of this coin is that op­portunities for older actors have been on the rise. Films reflect popular cultural contexts. The uptick in popularity of movies about older adults can be seen as a reflection of an aging population, a global demographic shift that is un­doubtedly increasing cultural conscious­ness, personal concerns, and curiosity about the nature of later life.

Brief History of Films on Aging

Several early films about elders have left their mark. Take, for example, Akira Kurosawa’s “Ikiru” (1952); Yasujirô Ozu’s “Tokyo Story” (1953), and Ingmar Bergman’s “Wild Strawberries” (1957). Nonetheless, drawing from internation­al sources for a compendium of feature films with aging themes, for the Ameri­can Psychological Association’s Division of Adult Development and Aging, Rick Scheidt, Ph.D., in 2003, listed 130 films, only 33 of which were made before 1980 (http://apadiv20.phhp.ufl.edu/cine­ma.htm).

With regard to gender, recent numbers tend to put the lie to a longstanding as­sertion still voiced today that acting op­portunities for women decline with age, compared with those for men. That may have been true in the past, but far less so recently. Of 27 actors I identified who are now 65 or older and still working (see sidebar; no doubt I’ve overlooked some, especially those from other countries), there is an equal division between men and women. This is also true for actors with the most film projects currently in progress.

Regarding films about aging made in America, Ira Rosofsky, Ph.D.,writing online for “Psycholo­gy Today” (Dec. 9, 2009), ob­served that in 2008, the Amer­ican Film Institute’s list of the “100 Best American Movies of the Past 100 Years” included just one with an aging sub­text. Somewhat surprisingly, it’s “The Godfather.” 

Whether this reflects a dearth of films or selection bias against older adults and their stories (“ageism”) isn’t clear. Among films nominated for that list, three that did not make the final cut fea­tured outstanding older protagonists: “Atlantic City” (starring Burt Lancast­er), “The Trip to Bountiful” (Geraldine Page) and “Driving Miss Daisy” (Jessica Tandy and Morgan Freeman).

Recent American Films

Complex aging issues have been ex­plored more frequently and effectively in some recent American movies. These films present a realistic sensibility and nu­anced character portrayals. Themes are not unexpected: retirement; loss and be­reavement; life review; the desire for re­demption and reconciliation with the past; dementia and its toll on caregivers (Reel Life, Clinical Psychiatry News, January 2006); intergenerational issues; assertions of autonomy and authentici­ty; and the continuing desire of aging in­dividuals for new, meaningful relation­ships and experiences (Reel Life, Clinical Psychiatry News, December 2008). The themes are not new (how could they be?); it is the construction of the stories and characters that have deep­ened beyond one-dimensional offerings that were more typical of earlier films.