YSFF Presents: I Like It Here (2024)

We talk or laugh about aging; its irritations and relentless progression, but we rarely confront the reality of dying or being left alone. Nor do we consider the lightness and calmness that can come when the success race seems not so crucial. I Like It Here is about all those things and, finally, about the pleasures of being alive. Filmmaker Ralph Arlyck tries to convey how it feels to be seeing the winding down of your life. He spends time with older friends from his past and present, most of them rather lively, plus children and grandchildren. Woven in with these scenes are personal reflections on the challenges of getting old; of feeling your joints and thoughts stiffen, as the camera confronts – both seriously and humorously — the obstacles that loom up in front of anyone who is on the last lap. The tone of the film isn’t sad; more wistful. The title’s declaration has a double meaning. The “here” that the filmmaker likes is both his immediate rural surroundings (the fields, water and neighbors he sees out his window) – and life itself. BADGES ACCEPTED

Host or Publisher Yellow Springs Film Festival