Review: The Way We Get By (2009) ****

Jerry Mundy, Joan Gaudet and Bill Knight: getting by

The Way We Get By, opening this weekend at Laemmle’s Music Hall in Los Angeles, is an Iraq documentary unlike any other. In the end, it really isn’t about Iraq at all. In telling its story of a group of senior citizens who turn up every day at an airport in Bangor, Maine to greet soldiers returning from Iraq or Afghanistan (and wish luck to the ones who are going in the other direction), The Way We Get By becomes in the end a moving study of people clinging to a sense of meaning and usefulness in a society that too often devalues them. In their own way, WWII veteran Bill Knight (87), grandmother Joan Gaudet (75) and former Marine Jerry Mundy (74) have the same vitality and charm as the folks in Young@Heart even if their means of expression don’t take place on a brightly lit stage.

Bangor is the first point on the continental United States reached by airplanes flying from the east, and the last point for those flying overseas. As such, it’s the normal waypoint for US troops shipping in and out of the country. In both cases the first or last faces the soldiers see are those of Knight, Guadet and Mundy who greet them with a handshake or a hug and a thanks for their service. It doesn’t seem like much until you witness first hand the emotional responses and genuine gratitude of the conflict hardened soldiers – men and women from all races and classes and from every part of the country.

It sounds corny and it probably is, but filmmaker Aron Gaudet (Joan’s son) is careful to show his subjects in all their faults as well as in all their goodness. The picture that emerges is of a group of decent human beings who aren’t perfect, but who just want to make something of their supposed golden years and, in the process, combat the crushing loneliness and corrosive despair that often accompanies them.

Though all three characters have their opinions about the politics behind the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, their actions transcend politics and so does this documentary. It’s not about right or left or right or wrong, it’s about people – those who are sent off to fight on their country’s behalf and those who fight the marginalization that comes with old age by expressing a simple thank you on the front lines of the soldiers’ homecoming.

If there’s one tiny complaint to be made about the film, it’s that Zack Martin’s score is a touch overbearing at times. This is a story that has plenty of its own emotion and it’s best left speaking for itself.

In the end, Gaudet followed this unlikely trio for three years and in that time they greeted an estimated 800,000 soldiers. Along the way he captured slices of three lives that are at turns sad, inspiring, funny and joyful. When Knight, Gaudet and Mundy return home each night after a day at the airport, there is no one waiting for them to thank them for their service, but in a larger sense that’s exactly what The Way We Get By does.

Note to LA residents: Writer/director/editor Aron Gaudet, producer/interviewer Gita Pullapilly and (I think) Jerry Mundy will be doing Q&A’s all this weekend (8/14-8/16) at Laemmle’s Music Hall for the film’s premiere.

The Way We Get By. USA 2009. Written, directed and edited by Aron Gaudet. Cinematography by Dan Ferrigan. Music score composed by Zack Martin. Interviews conducted by Gita Pullapilly. 1 hour 24 minutes. Not rated by the MPAA. 4 stars (out of 5)

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Tags: Aron Gaudet, Bill Knight, Dan Ferrigan, Gita Pullapilly, Jerry Mundy, Joan Gaudet, The Way We Get By, Zack Martin