Cliché as it may sound, Young@Heart is the feel-good hit of the year — a film that proves that age is only a state of mind, stardom is only a social security check away and wine and cheese aren’t the only things that get better with time.

Young@Heart, a chorus composed exclusively of senior citizens, has charmed prison inmates, European monarchs and everyone in between for more than 25 years with their eclectic and entertaining repertoire of songs by such disparate groups as The Police, Coldplay, The Clash and James Brown. In this delightful and unexpectedly moving documentary by British director Stephen Walker, cameras are there as the group comes together to prepare for their next tour.

With the curtains set to rise just seven weeks away, taskmaster choral director Bob has very little time to teach the group the new selection of songs, which include Sonic Youth’s inharmonious “Schizophrenia” and Allen Toussaint’s tongue-twisting “Yes, We Can Can.” Some members take to the new songs right away while others stumble through them for weeks, no closer to learning them than when they first heard them. As the weeks tick by, Bob grows increasingly concerned that the group won’t be ready in time. The finished product, not flawless by a long shot, is half the group’s (and the film’s) charm.

Young@Heart reinforces some stereotypes while simultaneously obliterating others. We both laugh at and with these “geriatrics behaving badly.” For every performer who pokes fingers in their ears at some discordant hymn or looks at a CD like its a piece of alien technology, there is another who cracks jokes like a stand-up comic or flirts with the reckless abandon of a pubescent teenager.

There is so much life here. The Young@Heart chorus is no novelty act. It is a serious musical undertaking populated by a community of performers who may appear frail and brittle on the outside but are lit from within by a fire that our youth-obsessed culture rarely ascribes to its elders. Performing the music keeps this group active, engaged in a supportive community and distracted from their ever-present ailments.

Despite an atmosphere rich with vitality, the specter of death is omnipresent. It strikes without warning, felling those we have grown to love. Overnight, duets tragically become solos. The group cannot sing The Bee Gees’ “Staying Alive” without reminding us what a tenuous bond these performers have on life. Bob Dylan’s “Forever Young” becomes a haunting eulogy to vanished youth and fallen friends, and The Clash’s “Should I Stay, or Should I Go?” becomes a poignant meditation on mortality.

Mixing rehearsals, American Idol-esque music videos and one-on-one interviews, Young@Heart is unpredictably hilarious, consistently moving and profoundly inspirational. It is a film that blasts our society’s negative attitudes toward the elderly by doing nothing more than showing them enjoying life to the fullest.

© Copyright 2008 Brandon Fibbs. All rights reserved.