How to Live Forever (2011)

The Worst Film Ever

Good movie, but best of all time? Hardly . . .

Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

From director Mark Wexler I expected funny and entertaining and quirky. "How to Live Forever" is so much more than that. From the very first scene, in which Wexler goes to visit Edna Parker, the oldest living person at 115, we are aware that the dark, devolution of aging will subtend whatever else the film promises to offer on the longevity front. Edna appears beyond this world, her tiny frame wrapped in a gauzy robe and propped in her wheelchair. Her sunken eyes remain expressionless as the cheery nursing home staff loudly announces Wexler's visit. She is unmoved by his friendly display of interest in her. We can't help but feel the discomfort of their disconnect. What is actually happening here? Might it be nothing more than voyeurism? Right when discomfort gets to be the main character, the scene shifts. Over and over the film proceeds this way, cutting from one speaker to another just after we begin to squirm, or laugh, or sink, or cry.You can't just watch "How to Live Forever" because the very topic requires participation. Wexler transparently models our assumptions, defenses, and uncertainties about the unassailable fact of our own demise. We can keep a distance perhaps when he's being gingerly hoisted into a casket by a "body scoop" demonstrated at a Las Vegas morticians' trade show (he's a corpse with a little smile), but his furtive measurement of midriff flab in a fast bathroom scene, or his earnest queries at a San Francisco Brain Gym lend a disarming intimacy to the wealth of attitudes and info the film presents us.Inevitably we are drawn in by the diversity and richness of the film's speakers—each is presented with a ticker counting up his/her age—and their particular cultural and historical contexts. I hope to remember forever the story of Jeanne Calment, the French woman who took up fencing at 85, long before she died at 122, and the film's poster boy, Buster Martin, who at 101 is doing the London marathon, smoking, drinking, and making hit rock band recordings, and especially Eleanor Wasson, my favorite, who at age 100 beautifully articulates her lifelong work for peace in the context of such diverse accomplishments as flying ferry ships in World War II and writing a book entitled "Twenty Eight Thousand Martinis," based on her personal practice of drinking one martini a day. Of course there are lots of luminaries here too, and they each offer a provocative angle—John Robbins, Marianne Williamson, Jack LaLanne (my other favorite), Suzanne Somers, Ray Bradbury—as do people on the street who respond to the question "If there was a pill to live for 500 years, would you take it?" As for the philosophical questions the film raises--Is the quest for longevity just 21st century narcissism? Will nanobots interacting with humans neurologically deliver us to the theater of radical life extension? Will the creation of the ageless society dwarf the age of the computer? to name just a few—"How to Live Forever" is full and fast paced enough to give us a sense of the possibilities, if not the answers. For this reason I suspect I'll be drawn to watch this film many more times. An added pleasure is the soundtrack, which is beautifully matched to the sequences, never overly obvious but always nuanced and compelling. And finally the haunting credit art, by Wexler's mother, Marian, is especially poignant. But you'll have to see the film to find out why.

When I first heard that it was a documentary about aging I was a little hesitant. Surprisingly, I enjoyed the film A LOT. "How to Live Forever" completely opened up my eyes to something that I never really put much thought into. Mark Wexler did an awesome job with the flow of the film and the interviews that he selected. In the beginning of the film, I thought it would conquer the question on how you can live forever. Wexler took us through a variety of interesting diets, exercises and life styles and traveled all around the world, but there was not a clear answer in the end. Not only was it entertaining to watch with the many fascinating interviewees but it was also educational as well. I found it inspiring to see adults in their 80's and 90's so happy. I'm not as afraid about aging as I was before…especially if I can tap dance like Dolores Bates can at 81 years old.

As I approach 25 years of age, I'm becoming more and more aware of my own mortality. I still feel quite young of course, but taking care of myself with the aim of a long, healthy life is now much more a priority than it was in my years of teenage reckless abandon. The realities of aging weigh down on me, the dread of my body turning on me for all I've put it through, the idea that possibilities and opportunities will diminish exponentially. Death has never sat particularly well with me either. I know I'm not alone in all this. But I realize now that this line of thinking is a result of a negative social perception of growing old, and that subscribing to this mindset without some optimistic moderation makes it rather self-fulfilling. The documentary How To Live Forever doesn't provide guidelines to answer its title, but it does provide variable glimpses at lives lived to the fullest and a few suggestions for getting there yourself. It's inspiring and funny and fascinating as filmmaker Mark Wexler confronts his own anxieties about aging and looks into how modern society is not only dealing with it, but trying to slow it down. I never imagined I could make it to 80 with any sort of quality in my life until I saw this film. The end result illustrates how unique and simultaneously universal each one of us is.

I personally really enjoyed this documentary. I feel like people that have disliked it have missed the actual message of the movie. I don't think its supposed to answer our questions about how to actually live forever, as much as its supposed to answer our questions about the best ways to live. If we figure out how to live right (mentally, emotionally, spiritually, and physically) and living to the fullest by doing the things we love, we may end up figuring out how to live as long as we can. I think he tries to show us that if we lead happy lives, our lives will thank us with extra time and longevity. He does an excellent job at combining both the non physical things we can do (i.e. spiritually, emotionally) with the physical things like nutrition and cosmetic. Although handling a touchy subject he manages a smooth unfolding with lighthearted humor.