A Kind of Madness is a family story from South Africa. It includes scenes from the past, the present, and from the broken mind of the family matriarch. Most of the past scenes come from the mother’s mind and what she remembers is fractured and sometimes not real.

A Kind of Madness was recommended to me by a reader, Christine. She was right in thinking it’s the kind of film I like to talk about here.

Elna (Sandra Prinsloo), the mother, has many years of gaps in what she remembers from the past and where she is now. She lives in a care home for memory patients. She thinks she’s still young. (Ashley de Lange played the young Elna.) She recognizes her husband Dan (Ian Roberts) when he comes to visit, but she thinks he’s young Dan (played by Luke Volker) and he’s come to get her out of the awful place.

She convinces Dan to help her escape and they take off. Their three grown children Ralph (Evan Hengst), Olivia (Amy Louise Wilson), and Lucy (Erica Wessels) follow them using their phone to see where they are.

The children argue constantly, as children do, while chasing after their parents. The parents try everything to get away and be left alone.

Dan and Elna return to a spot by the ocean where they first met. Elna is aware that she keeps hallucinating an opera singer in a red dress and she tells Dan she isn’t right. But they want to be together always anyway. Youth isn’t the only time for deep and passionate love.

No matter how much they argue or disagree about the best way to care for Elna, the people in this family all love each other. It’s love that finally sets the course for the family and the future for Elna and Dan.

It’s a heartwarming film. The South African countryside is stunning to view. The people they meet are kind.

There are so many films now about the tragic losses that come from dementia which affects so many families. This family found a different way to deal with it.

A Kind of Madness was written and directed by Christiaan Olwagen. It’s streaming on Prime Video.