Finding Ourselves in the Film, 'What They Had'

“What They Had” is a movie that focuses on a family dealing with their matriarch’s Alzheimer’s disease.

The movie was released at the Sundance Film Festival in 2018, and had an all-star cast including Blythe Danner, Hillary Swank, Michael Shannon, and Robert Forster. The opening credits are made up of flashes of old, shaky, blurry frames of 8 mm films pieced together.

Danner plays a mother whose condition is deteriorating. The movie opens with her climbing out of bed in the middle of the night and getting dressed. She gets up, pulls on stockings, puts on lipstick, throws a coat on over her gown, and heads out into the snow. She makes tracks down the road in the fresh blanket of white with only street lamps to light the way as blizzard conditions ensue. Later on in the movie, her son (Michael Shannon) has an epiphany about where she was going. His mother had caught a train and gone in the direction of her childhood home. She thought she was young again, and was heading home to her family who must have been worried sick.

When a loved one with Alzheimer's seems to be lost

Her son said she wanted to go home. This especially hit home for me, pun intended.

When we were caring for Daddy, he came home between placements. He had spent nearly all of his 73 years on Troy Road. The road was named after his father and cut through vast fields of cotton or soybeans depending on the year. He knew these roads, these fields, these woods, and this house like the back of his hand, or he did before 2015.

One of his sleepless nights here, he told us he wanted to go home as he sat in his recliner, in his spot, in his house. That was such a hard pill to swallow. There was nothing much we could do. Arguing with him or trying to bring him back to our reality seemed useless.

My little brother, who has Daddy’s eyes, looked at him and said, “I’ll take you home, but we will wait until morning.” That satisfied him for the time being. This reassured him in the alternate reality he was living in.

When a loved one with Alzheimer's forgets people and places

Not recognizing people and places seemed to be par for the course for Ruth, who was played by Danner. She looks at her husband and daughter at one point and says, “How do you two know each other?”

Daddy usually knew we were his. He knew we were family, but his name recall did fade. He sometimes referred to me as his daughter, but rarely said my name. My brother became his boy. He called my niece “Memphis,” because of where she went to college and lived. He referred to a nurse he’d only known a few days as his wife. His reality was constantly altered. He was a true time-traveler going back and forth in time, and jumping from place to place in his mind.

Relating to the movie characters' universal struggles

'What They Were' will likely hit home for you too. You’ll recognize yourself and your family members.

Michael Shannon played a son with a quick fuse who wanted to place his mother in a memory care facility. He had the best of intentions, but lacked patience.

Hilary Swank played a daughter who lived far away, and flew in at the drop of a hat to help search for her mother. She also meant well, but was pulled between her demanding brother and her doting father’s wishes.

Robert Forster played a dedicated husband who truly believed in “in sickness and in health, till death do us part,” and would not entertain the thought of any sort of care facility.

Blythe Danner played the role of a woman who was struggling to hang onto her life while her brain played tricks on her.

You likely know all of those characters. You may be one of those characters. The movie gives what feels like a real-life look into the struggles that people with Alzheimer’s and their families face. It also lets us know we are not alone. All of our lives boil down to old, shaky, blurry frames of 8 mm films of our memories pieced together in the end.

I highly recommend this more-than-relatable film and commend the actors who really dug into their roles. Two enthusiastic thumbs up from this self-proclaimed critic.