HIT to show 'Age of Love'

IRONWOOD — For Valentine’s Day weekend, the Iron County Health Department and Historic Ironwood Theatre invite the public to attend the free movie presentation of “The Age of Love” on Saturday, starting at 2 p.m.

Zona Wick, health department director, said the event is made possibly by a grant from the Aging Friendly Iron County Community Coalition.

“If there is a greater universal truth than the power of music,” Wick said, “it is the power of love.”

“The Age of Love” is a new documentary that captures the nature of love through a “humorous, poignant and unprecedented inside” look at the dating scene for 70- to 90-year-olds.

Wick said it is a simple, honest look at ordinary people finding themselves unexpectedly looking for love in late life.

The documentary follows older adults who agreed to be filmed as they participate in the emotional roller-coaster of speed dating. Wick said speed dating is a growing trend nationally.

When filmmaker Steven Loring learned that 30 adults aged 70 to 90 signed up for a speed dating event in his hometown of Rochester, N.Y., he started calling participants to ask if he could interview them and film their experience.

Wick said speed dating is a structured event that gathers a group of singles together and pairs them with one another in a series of five-minute mini-dates. Participants note down potential romantic interests on a scorecard that is submitted to an organizer after the event. No contact information is exchanged, but if the scorecard indicates chemistry, individuals are notified by mail and it’s up to them to take it from there.

Wick said one audience member at an early screening called it “the best reality show I have ever seen.” 

Wick said dating late in life is no joke.

“We are inundated with cultural messages and advertisements telling us we are less beautiful and less desirable the older we get,” Wick said.

She said many people find themselves alone and isolated just at the point in life when they most need and desire companionship.

As Janice, one of the film subjects, put it, “The heart might even be capable of more love now than before because I think I have a lot of love to give, but I don’t have all the distractions I had before.”

Loring told Senior Planet about an even more poignant conversation he had with another subject in the film. That woman told him, “My own children don’t ask me what’s in my heart, what I’m feeling. They ask me what I need, they take care of me, they love me. But they never ask me about what I’m feeling emotionally. And I have so much to tell you…”

From a critical standpoint, Wick said it’s a phenomenal film, “no question.” But from a transformational viewpoint, “this film humanizes aging in an unprecedented way.”

“This film lets viewers — no matter their age — genuinely experience the truth that love and companionship transcend age,” she said.

Wick said the film “flies in the face of our culture’s rampant ageism, perpetuated by the mass media through propaganda that tells us that love, passion, sex and beauty are the exclusive domains of youth.”

“When they put themselves out there and participated in this event, these people just came alive,” Loring said. “They told me they felt liberated from society’s stereotypes.”

Wick said our mainstream media uses propaganda to dehumanize old people and pressures people into buying youth-centric products.

“Is there a more damaging stereotype than the myth that older people or disabled people or people living with cognitive changes like dementia do not desire or deserve love, companionship and physical intimacy as much as anyone else?” Wick asked.

She said the beauty and power of “The Age of Love” is that it doesn’t hit viewers over the head with this message or an agenda. There are no fairy-tale endings in this film, Wick said.

“It simply gives viewers the experience of feeling what those in the movie feel,” she said.

There will be free popcorn and Valentine cookies. During the presentation, there will be a drawing for free tickets to attend Theatre North’s matinee performance of “The last Romance,” directed by Sandy Gertz.

—Tom Stankard