BBFF2023 - The Last Two Weeks at Longlee

The 2023 Byron Bay International Film Festival ends its season with the NSW Premiere of local filmmaker Susie Forster's intimate and loving documentary. The Last Two Weeks at Longlee will be preceded by a short film and followed by a fascinating discussion with Susie Forster and Zenith Virago.

When Victorian artist Lee Stephenson discovers she is dying and requests, in no uncertain terms, to die at home, her daughter, a filmmaker, captures this extraordinarily personal window into the last two weeks of her life. Shot at "Longlee," her mother’s art-filled home in the stunning Goulburn Valley, we witness the 82-year-old artist navigate her impending death, veering between grace, anger, clarity and confusion.

 

We meet Susie, daughter and intrepid filmmaker; Roger, the practical and attentive husband; and Domini, Lee’s insightful singer/songwriter granddaughter. In unusually intimate footage, they disclose their real feelings about seeing Lee dying, paint a picture of how close she came to refusing medical help and how the eventual doctors' visit triggered the state-funded palliative care. We see the generosity of spirit of the home care support team and Roger drawing on his farming background to care for his dying wife. Domini shares her shock at seeing Lee 'this sick,' while still at home in her own bed - one now swapped out for a hospital bed (a "must-have" for anyone dying at home, according to the palliative care team). We meet an almost unrecognisable younger Lee, showing off her garden in footage shot 16 years earlier. With love, humour and sadness, and in the thick of COVID restrictions, they work together to grant Lee her final wish - to die at home.

 

VENUE INFORMATION: Please note the Brunswick Picture House is located in Brunswick Heads NSW, in the Northern Rivers region (not in Brunswick VIC). Please select your tickets carefully as no refund or credit will be granted for errors in identifying the venue location.

 

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