Visions Of Eldercare, 1932

Super sleuth Davrie Caro sent me a link to the 1932 film “If I Had a Million,” a collective work by different writers and directors. It tells the story of a very rich man, apparently on death’s door, who realizes that he doesn’t want to give away his money to his family or his employees.  Instead, he picks random people out of the phone book and gives them each a million dollars (worth about twenty-four million today.)  A series of vignettes shows what each recipient does, and not all have happy endings.  However, the final story illustrates what money and imagination can do to improve the lives of old people. 

Mary Walker, the final recipient of the windfall, lives in a glum “rest place for elderly women.”  Above on the right you see the strict director chiding women for playing cards against the rules.  It is a bleak place.  The furniture is institutional, pets are not allowed, the women must wear uniforms, and the food is bad.

Mary had tried to rebel with little success until she gets the big check, delivered by the rich old man himself.  She uses the money to change everything about the facility, beginning with the name.  It’s now a club, not a rest place. 

The women can now wear their own clothes and play cards.  They bring in furniture and flowers.  They take over the kitchen.  They hold dance parties with men. Instead of firing the old workers, they let them stay only if they agree to sit in rocking chairs doing nothing all day long.

The revamp is so successful that it even transforms the rich old man. Brought back to health, at the end of film he is heading off to one of the club’s dance evenings. 

Take a look—it might raise your spirits.