<p>I’m responsible for updating my parents netflix dvd queue. My father has terminal cancer and my 80 year old mother is his caregiver. I’m looking for some movie suggestions to put in their netflix queue. It would primarily be my mother watching and it would be her escape from the stress of her current situation. I put in Strut for New Year’s and she enjoyed that so the list doesn’t have to just be mindless comedies. I need to avoid movies though that have any violence or deal with death or dying even if it’s in a funny way.</p>
<p>My father might watch if it was something light that he found interesting, which would cheer my mother up to have his companionship. The movies they’ve enjoyed watching together are My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Outsourced, Mama Mia (they really enjoyed this one - ordered it a few times - my dad did amateur musical theatre in his retirement so he enjoys musicals). I don’t want to have to resort to movies from 60 years ago though. Looking for fairly recent movies.</p>
<p>I have recently watched Mrs Pettigrew lives for a Day, with Frances McDormand , & Mrs Henderson presents, with Judi Dench.</p>
<p>& State & Main by David Mamet.
There are really alot of nice little films that get over looked compared to the Will Farrell " comedies".</p>
<p>The Station Agent, Importance of Being Ernest, The Englishman who went up a hill but came down a mountain. Jeeves & Wooster (I like television series since I often don’t have time to watch a movie)</p>
<p>You might want to also get recommendations for television shows on netflix. I won’t always make time for a 2 hour movie, but a 40 minute television show is not that difficult to fit in.</p>
<p>I get my mom, who’s of similar vintage, DVDs. She enjoyed Julie Julia. And the first season of Mad Men (she hadn’t seen it before) which she liked because she lived through that era.</p>
<p>If they liked films with foreign characters, they might enjoy *The Terminal *with Tom Hanks. It has nothing to do with terminal ilnesses; rather it is a story of a foreigner wo came to the US with a very specific mission and got permanently stuck at the airport terminal due to passport issues. Funny and heartwarming.</p>
<p>I also suggest checking reviews on the IMDb for any recommended films just to be absolutely sure.</p>
<p>Would they be up for any animation? You can’t go wrong with any Pixar film or anything Wallace and Gromit, and “How to Train Your Dragon” was excellent. </p>
<p>These are fun and to the best of my memory have no death in them:
Nine To Five
My Best Friend (French comedy with Daniel Autiel)
Elling
The Devil Wears Prada
The World’s Fastest Indian
Fever Pitch (the american version)
Good Bye, Lenin!</p>
<p>I’m responsible for updating my mother’s Netflix queue, also. She was until recently the caregiver for my father, who died of cancer in the summer. And she is in her late 80s. So there are a lot of similarities!</p>
<p>Of the things she has enjoyed recently that meet your criteria, I’d suggest The Blind Side and While You Were Sleeping. She also loved Billy Elliot, but it does deal with the death of a parent. She liked What’s Eating Gilbert Grape, Young Victoria, Moonstruck, and Monsoon Wedding, as well as a bunch of more serious movies that perhaps you would prefer to avoid. It sounds as if your parents would enjoy Strictly Ballroom, an Australian movie that is a lot of fun.</p>
<p>Best in Show, Oh Brother Where art Thou?, Enchanted, Strictly Ballroom, Green Card,
and I know that this is an oldie, but my folks REALLY loved watching Michael Powells “I Know Where I’m Going” when they visited at Christmas.</p>
<p>Years ago, I worked for a man in his late 70s whose wife was on hospice. Every afternoon he would go home and watch movies with her. They (he) really liked completely zany, sophomoric, satiric comedies – Airplane was one of his favorites. Anything with Leslie Nielsen or Chevy Chase. He just loved a completely forgettable Chevy Chase movie called Modern Problems. And of course all of the Naked Guns, and Animal House, and Mel Brooks movies like Spaceballs, Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstein, High Anxiety, Robin Hood: Men In Tights.</p>
<p>Some recent teen comedies are really pretty good movies, and are wonderful escapism for the non-teens among us. Try the classics updates: Clueless, 10 Things I Hate About You, Get Over It, Easy A.</p>
<p>My 80-year-old father likes to see things blow up in action movies like the Lethal Action and Die Hard series, True Lies, superhero movies and the like. The recent RED, an action movie groomed for the AARP crowd, could work.</p>
<p>You should be able to get old movies, too, like Affair to Remember with Cary Grant, The Glenn Miller Story, etc</p>
<p>What about Beyond the Sea, the Bobby Darin story? I have not seen it for a few years so do not recall if there is any modern inappropriateness!!</p>
<p>My DD turned on good old Parenthood with Steve Martin, thinking that would be safe with Gma watching and, oh my, we had to do some quick channel flipping- the teen kid porn, the car crash, and the power outage…didn’t even think of those ahead of time!!!</p>
<p>How about the 1942 classic “Holiday Inn” with Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire. (they were dancer/singer/entertainers in fancy clubs and one of them moved to Connecticut an bought an old inn where he put on shows every holiday.</p>
<p>My dad used to love those old Jerry Lewis/ Dean Martin movies and my mom loved Doris Day movies.</p>
<p>For your Mom maybe the Jane Austen movies. Or some of the other costume dramas - like The Young Victoria, I loved Ang Lee’s Eat, Drink, Man Woman if you can deal with subtitles.</p>
<p>Maybe courtroom dramas like Twelve Angry Men?</p>
<p>Maybe sports movies? Bull Durham, Chariots of Fire…</p>
<p>October Sky, Apollo 13, Rocket Boys</p>
<p>Billy Elliot, The Full Monty, Once</p>
<p>The Truman Show</p>
<p>Driving Miss Daisy? (I can’t remember does it have a sad ending?)</p>