‘A Good Way to Die?’ by Tash Christie and Dan Salmon

Produced in Aotearoa/New Zealand when assisted dying was illegal, this film meets four people who want voluntary assisted deaths or want voluntary assisted dying to be legalized. Philip is a happy active 81-year-old with terminal prostate cancer. He and wife Jenny agree he should be able to die when he chooses, to avoid a bad ending to a good life. Philip demonstrates the plastic bag technique he plans to use when the time comes and is shown messing around in his custom-made coffin. 80-year-old Lillian, a former showgirl and rest home manager, lives alone and wants to avoid a protracted death like her father’s. After attending many of Dr Philip Nitschke’s talks in Auckland, she travels to the USA and Mexico with fellow Exit International members to purchase Nembutal from a veterinary store. After a nostalgic ‘last’ holiday, she says she only has a few things left to sort before she ‘does it’. Kate, an ex-journalist, lives alone and has McCune-Albright Syndrome. Her condition is progressive and she’s likely to die of complications from increasingly fragile bones. She is shown struggling to get around her flat and talking about the violent suicide options currently available to her. Peter has an unnamed lung condition and needs oxygen 16 hours a day. He wants the ‘dignity, pride and self-respect’ he believes assisted dying would provide, but his partner Beth refuses to support his decision. The film ends with updates on each participant, focusing on the direct cremation of Lillian whose cause of death has not been confirmed by the coroner.

Produced for TV3’s mainstream ‘Inside New Zealand’ slot, the film addresses a serious confronting topic in a matter-of-fact and light tone. Assisted dying is depicted as a fitting ending to the lives of people who have valued their own autonomy, most of whom are educated and articulate. Each participant openly and calmy discusses their arguments for assisted dying, sometimes alongside supportive family members. Yet the mood of the film is often upbeat and casual, with retro music and interviewees referring to voluntary assisted dying with phrases like ‘topping yourself’ or ‘doing yourself in’. In some ways, the decision to seek voluntary assisted dying is implied to be idiosyncratic, perhaps something that requires the person to be old or a little mad – or both. Kate’s jerky manner of delivery and Peter and Beth’s back-and-forth banter has a strangeness which is endearing but perhaps leaves the audience sitting on the fence about whether people who make these decisions are fully rational or ‘normal’. At the same time, their stories could be interpreted along the lines of a typically Kiwi sense of self-determination and individualism, exemplified by Philip’s self-built house and outdoorsy identity. There is limited evidence now available online of the documentary’s impact, but Lillian’s narrative of purchasing and (probably) using Nembutal likely drew media attention, albeit at a time when parliament was nowhere near considering the legalisation of assisted dying. The film won the Quantas Film and TV Awards for Best Popular Documentary in 2009.