Hannah Free

Sharon Gless (of Cagney and Lacey, remember?) plays Hannah, an elderly disabled lesbian now living in an institutional home, where around the corner and down three corridors, her life-long lover, Rachel, lies comatose and dying.

The nursing staff and Rachel’s daughter refuse to allow Hannah to visit Rachel, “for their own good”. Sounds like a bit of a downer, right? There’s nothing, however, morbid or gloomy about Hannah Free. Between the light-handed, easy and beautiful cinematography and the humour and low-key courage of the screenplay, this movie is enchanting, romantic and paced with a delicacy that will keep questions about life and love in your mind long after the last shot. Made on a skimpy budget in three weeks, Hannah Free shows no signs of anything but professionalism and passion. As strategies to bring Hannah and Rachel together unfold, so too do questions about what it really means to fight for her, right up until the moment of deathdo-us-part.