Thank You and Goodnight

Stars: Jan, Helen, Ricky, and Mae Oxenberg. One of the most beautiful movies of this or any other year, filmmaker Jan Oxenberg's Thank You and Goodnight, a creative documentary about the death of her grandmother Mae, is a bold and ultimately comforting film about death and dying. It's also funnier than hell. Oxenberg uses humorous life-size cartoon cutouts representing herself as a young child and her grandmother to chronicle her early years in a New York Jewish community. As Jan grew older, she saw her grandmother less and less. But in her twilight years, Mae asked her granddaughter to tape and record some conversations. Oxenberg's film is a marvelous pastiche of family talk, old photos, 8mm film, food, and a constant inquiry about what things mean: family relationships, time, life, death, and the rules for playing solitaire. Throughout, Oxenberg's voice-over narration and cartoon figures ask those questions that we ask ourselves mostly in private: Why do people have to die? Why do we have to suffer? Is there life after death? Although Oxenberg's film is never exploitative, it's also not sugar-coated. We see grandmother Mae, clearly in pain with labored breathing, shortly before her death. It makes you cry, but that's life. Really life. Winner of numerous awards, Thank You and Goodnight is a very special film which entertains, enlightens, instructs, and comforts. It's marvelous medicine for the soul. Audience: A few might be upset, but most will be truly grateful to see this.