Quartet (Quick Review)

While Quartet has many positive qualities to it (comedy, characters, music, etc…), what I really enjoyed about it was its self-awareness that life for most of these characters is nearing the end and that sometime soon (maybe several years, maybe several weeks) they quite possibly could be dead (Now I know that sounds horrifically grim, but hold on and see where I’m going).  Each of the four main characters is shown to be having issues with their mental and physical health (a bad heart, a decaying memory, a damaged hip).  Even the issues they’re facing in the film are shown to be short termed; for example during the scene where they discuss how the four main characters’ quartet can make enough money to save the retirement home, it’s not said “you’ll save it so the retirement home can go on forever” but instead “you’ll make enough to keep it going for at least another year, maybe even two.” 

Things get old and eventually stop (both people and places respectively); the film is well aware of that.  But instead of focusing on the sad and depressing issues this can bring, Quartet decides to focus on the good and happiness still left; that no matter how little time you've got left in life people can still make the best of it.  It chooses to focus on the happiness, joy, and comedy life can still have during your final years on earth (as long as you make the best of it).  The film also contains the theme of redemption; that it’s never too late to make up or fix something for the better.  It’s with these ideas in mind that Quartet becomes a film of comedy, romance, and enjoyment while still accepting the theme of death.  Quartet is aware of reality but chooses to focus on the good left rather than sulk on the regrets of the past.  And at the elderly age of 76 years old, you've got to wonder if this theme held personal significance to Dustin Hoffman when he decided to make his director’s debut with this well made piece of cinema.