An elderly Holocaust survivor starts showing more and more sign of deteriorating memory causing him to be lost to time and not always recognize his own wife.
Written and directed by Nicholas Paskhover, Dance with Me is an intimate look at what happens when someone with complex trauma faces memory loss and the difficulties of aging. The writing here is personal and filled with emotions, carefully building scenes, showing bits and pieces of the way memory loss affects people through character development and interactions. The direction is also careful, calculated, and it works great with the writing. Together, the writing and direction create a powerful, personal, and intimate look into aging and how it affects others.
The cast is led by Elya Baskin as Sasha, the man losing his memory, and Laraine Newman as his wife Anya. The two of them give layered, nuanced, and on point performances, each having their own persona and their own emotions in a less-than-ideal situation. They show a wide spectrum of emotions without feeling like it’s too much or off. They show that working as a team, during the good and the bad, is what it takes to truly show the reality of their characters’ situation. The supporting cast is also good, but they get much less time each to really have much of an impact or be fully memorable.
The cinematography here is solid with a few shaky moments here and there that can easily be forgiven. The lighting is lovely throughout the film; the past and the present have slightly different looks which helps identify the scenes quickly, the framing works great, and the overall look of the film is great with fantastic work from Evan Weidenkeller. The editing by Shannon C. Griffin works great with all of this.
The film here is a love letter to love, to couples who stay together no matter what, and it makes a point that sometimes, loving someone means doing what is best for them and not necessarily what they want. The film is touching, emotional, careful, and sensitive. It’s the kind of short film that takes its limited runtime, makes the most of it, and really shows the viewers what the filmmaker wants them to understand without hitting them over the head with the morale of the story or the message. Dance with Me shows the viewers a glimpse of true love with its difficulties and its joys, even later in life.