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On Golden Pond Essay

Decent Essays

One can’t help but to draw links to the aging process when watching the three times Oscar winning movie On Golden Pond. In Mark Rydell's On Golden Pond, we encounter a couple in the middle of dealing with the anxieties and hardship of moving through the latter part of their life cycle. The older actors played by Henry Fonda and Katharine Hepburn demonstrates different levels of activity, age stratification, continuity, and disengagement theory in their lives.
Activity Theory argues that the more active a people are the more likely they are to be satisfied with like (Moody & Sasser, 2015). This is evident throughout the movie as Ethel tries to get Norman to be more engaging with life. Ethel is active, very optimistic and has a positive outlook …show more content…

Age Stratification Theory is simple a system by which a society ranks categories of people in hierarchy according to their age bracket. When Ethel levels Norman alone with the gas attendants they quickly begin to question Norman’s ability to function due to his age. One of the attendant even question the existent of gas during Norman’s time. Ethel doesn’t experience the same level of age stratification because she is significantly younger than Norman, which places her in a different age category. Also Ethel is more functional than …show more content…

He finds as he advances more and more toward his 80th birthday his mental and physical functionality are noticeably degrading. Even with these diminishing abilities Norman turns his life around by employing Activity Theory. His preoccupied thoughts of death begin to fade and he has sense of fulfillment when he begins to mentor a young boy. On Golden Pond shows how Norman over comes his growing thoughts, anger and fear of growing old and finally death. Growing old is process and everyone has to find our own way. It also show there is no one theory that encompasses everything that a person deals with as they transition into old age. Lastly the film depicts how these changes effect the supporting family member as they come to grip with a love one who in the last stages of

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