Some Kind of Heaven
Behind the gates of a palm-tree-lined fantasyland, three residents and one interloper at America’s largest retirement community strive to find happiness.
- Released: 2021-02-19
- Runtime: 83 minutes
- Genre: Documentaries
- Stars: Dennis Dean, Lynn Henry, Anne Kincer, Reggie Kincer, Gary Schwartz, Barbara Stanton
- Director: Lance Oppenheim
Comments
- tobiasedwards-96622 - 26 July 2023
Weird and Misplaced Docufilm from America's Most Prolific Propagandists
The New York Times, like any giant media firm, makes its bones by painting you a reality. For some reason, the reality they want to create in this documentary is based upon the largest retirement community in the United States - The Villages, in central Florida. So, like the creepy weirdos they are at the NYT, they decided to profile a semi-homeless con artist in a van (who doesn't actually live there), a man suffering with dementia, and a poor, lonely woman who just lost her husband only 4 months prior. In a community of 100,000+ people, they basically scraped the bottom of the barrel and chose 3 very vulnerable and damaged people to take advantage of. Through very manipulative editing, depressing music and prison lighting, these 3 individuals become the microcosm of The Villages. Essentially, it's a parody film created by predators who want you to think this is a nightmarish, dystopian fantasy world. This isn't honest film making. It's a strange attempt to portray a community, culture and people as backwards. If they chose to profile these individuals against an honest backdrop of the actual community, that would be one thing. Instead, they use them as props with clever editing to convince you that life truly sucks at The Villages. A familiar strategy from from a once respected institution in the NYT. The Mass Media is vile. If you want toxic, vile trash - please watch this documentary produced by the NYT. A piece of garbage masquerading as a behind the scenes look on America's Baby Boomer generation. - rkopek - 7 September 2021
Not what The Villages about.
Picking dysfunctional people to represent what the Villages about not fair. You can find same in any neighborhood near you. One man not even a true resident but a drifter looking for a rich lady to take advantage of. - julieshotmail - 14 April 2021
Wherever you go, there you are
Disguised as a documentary set in the The Villages, an idyllic, fast-growing retirement community in Florida, this is really more of a commentary on mental illness. The three characters are unable to truly enjoy the privileged resources surrounding them because they refuse to let go of their baggage, and the fourth one is merely a cheat and doesn't really belong here. The Villages has become very popular over the years because it offers a positive way to spend the last years of life - so many resources, so many activities, so many events, so many potential friends. Any thankful person with self-respect would want to take advantage of such things and engage in stimulating activities for their health and well-being as they ride off into the sunset. The ones who would squander all of this away haven't already learned in their late years that the key to happiness is letting go. But then again, not injecting some crisis and conflict into this staged documentary would make it really boring.
