Cert 12A
72 mins
BBFC advice: TBA
I am willing to bet that I will not be more touched by a film than I Am Breathing this year.
There, that's said it. I may have had a bit of a giggle but overall I found it utterly devastating.
Emma Davie and Morag McKinnon recorded the last months of the life of Neil Platt who was struck down with Motor Neurone Disease.
Their documentary highlights just how savage a death this is. Its sufferers lose their motor skills - in Neil's case, starting at his big toe and ending with the ability to swallow.
Meanwhile, they lose none of their mental faculties nor their sensitivity to pain.
Neil was diagnosed with MND when he was just 33, the father of a baby who would not be able to remember him.
Video footage shows that he previously had a huge appetite for life; a motorcyclist and something of an overall daredevil.
He was married to a former university friend, Louise, who was clearly incredibly dedicated to her ailing husband but kept good humour virtually until the end.
The point of I Am Breathing is to raise awareness of Motor Neurone Disease and with this reason in mind Neil wrote a blog following his diagnosis.
He dictated this into a computer sound machine but this wasn't as easy as it appears and caused him endless frustration.
But he was determined to pursue the cause because MND was not only killing him but it had also claimed his life of his dad at just 51, a decade previously.
At times I Am Breathing seems a bit intrusive as we see Neil ebb away at virtually the same rate as his son Oscar is growing up.
But Neil and Louise Platt recognised how important it was to have a record of that time and show the world the devastation caused by this dreadful disease.
Laughs: two
Jumps: none
Vomit: none
Nudity: none
Overall rating: 9/10