Stairlift To Heaven (C4): Anyone who believes soaps don't reflect real life would've been surprised to find this documentary in The Trouble With Old People season mirroring events in Coronation Street at present.
In the week that fictional son Danny started looking for a residential home for ailing father Mike Baldwin, real life Geoff was shown seeking a place for his 90-year-old father Lew.
Both elderly men have Alzheimer's, although in Mike's case you wonder if the acceleration of the condition hasn't been speeded up for dramatic purposes. Of course, the Street's airing of the increasingly-common dilemma facing families caring for sick older relatives will reach many more millions of people than any C4 documentary.
Kira Phillips Dibb's film was a candid and honest look at 65-year-old Geoff's struggle to get his father into a home - and have him agree to stay there. The film-maker wasn't afraid to ask, from behind the camera, the questions that viewers were asking themselves.
"Does Geoff always shout as much?," she asked Lew, after his son lost his temper at his father's forgetfulness.
"Always, he frightens me to death," replied Lew.
Telling us that "the final journey will stretch their relationship to the limit" was melodramatic but, as the story unfolded, my sympathy switched between father and son.
You understood that Lew deserved to be treated with dignity, just as you felt for Geoff who'd looked forward to retiring to the south of France but found himself at the beck and call of an unpredictable father with whom he'd clashed as a young man.
"I would like my father to live to 100, but in a home," said Geoff.
Lew, in his more lucid moments, said that his son gave the impression he'd be happy to see him go into a home. "I think he's a bit browned off with me as a father," he said.
He agreed to a short, trial stay in a residential home. What I saw of the place, despite it being clean and friendly, didn't make me want to put my name down for a room. I could understand Lew's reluctance to give up his independence after seeing scenes of life in the home - wheelchair disco-dancing to Abba, daily fitness classes and arguing with similarly ill old people over war experiences.
Geoff, reaching the end of his tether at his father's constant phone calls and demands, sought help in a carers' support group after counsellors, doctors and medication had failed.
I'm not sure that having the song, There's A Place For Us, on the soundtrack as Lew packed his bags to go into the home was necessary. Otherwise, this was a sad, thought-provoking film about a problem that many of us won't be able to escape, either as a carer or a sufferer.
Coronation Street, incidentally, is taking the easy way out and having Mike Baldwin die next week, putting both him and his son out of their misery.
Published: 31/03/2006
