Here is the provocative question posed by documentary filmmaker Mark Wexler in his latest work, How To Live Forever: If you could take a pill that would allow you to live 500 more years, would you?

Well?

Prompted by his mother’s death and his own journey beyond age 50, Wexler set out to look at aging from angles I couldn’t have imagined – i.e., laughter yoga, elder porn, the funeral business, calorie restriction (or not). He traveled widely for three years exploring these things and the result is a laugh-out-loud, thought-provoking film that simultaneously upends and validates what we might think contributes to longevity.

Sprinkled throughout is the aforementioned question, done in a man-on-the-street style. It produces a range of answers, as did my own unofficial “research” source – my Facebook page. I’m starting to see the “500 years pill” question as a gauge in the category of the bucket list. The response to either is much more telling than one might think.

For example, from my friends on Facebook, there were thoughts like what it might be like to live 500 more years, but to stay at age 40. Or what about the state of the body and mind as a factor in the decision? The most telling response? “If that was the only pill I’d have to take for 500 years.” Of course, how do we leave health out of this discussion?

Perhaps the most compelling contrast in How To Live Forever  was provided by the stories of 101-year-old Buster Martin of London and America’s own Jack LaLanne, now 94. Where LaLanne’s backdrop is mostly his kitchen (where he juices a carrot concoction) and his weight room, Martin’s is the garage where he works – yes, present tense -- as a plumber and the pub where he likes to hang out. Martin is seen preparing for an upcoming marathon in Edinburgh with a personal trainer.

“I don’t drink water,” he says. “No, I don’t drink water in a marathon. Give me a beer. Even before I done the [London] marathon, I had to have a fag [cigarette] and a pint before I started. I had five rests. That was five pints and five fags.”

Martin seems to subscribe to that fun quote of unknown source that keeps circulating: “Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather skidding sideways, Chardonnay in one hand, strawberries in the other, body thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and screaming – ‘Woohoo! What a RIDE!’” That’s not to say Martin isn’t physically well preserved, but this truly captures his spirit.

Yet there is also LaLanne, who works out two hours a day and says things like “There’s so much work to be done yet” and “The good old days are this second.” A sound philosophy that has produced a vibrant life for an American fitness legend.

The film has interviews with Marianne Williamson, Suzanne Somers, Phyllis Diller. I was delighted to “meet” Eleanor Wasson, whose book 28,000 Martinis and Counting – A Century of Living, Learning and Loving is now on my must-read list. Devoted to many social and political causes, she died in 2008 while Wexler was making the film, but her appearance in it makes a splash.

All told, I’m not sure how I would answer the “500 year pill” question. Taking into account what experts in the movie have to say about spirit, hormones, sex, love, food and preservation, I’m left vacillating between getting lots and lots (and lots!) done and seeing what kind of progress takes place in the next 500 years or striving to live well and meaningfully in a shorter, more conventional time span. Maybe I can split the difference.

For some quirky reason, I suppose, I am drawn to another question posed by Wexler on his film’s Web site: Can it be that life’s true meaning is found in the humble chili dog?

Change that to sauerkraut and mustard and I’m in.

 

Nancy Colasurdo is a practicing life coach and freelance writer. Her Web site is www.nancola.com. Please direct all questions/comments to FOXGamePlan@gmail.com.