Family dynamics change dramatically and often tragically as parents and grandparents grow older. Some children continue to love their parents in their senior years and care for them when they become infirmed. But others turn their back on their loved ones and forget to “honor thy father and thy mother.”

King Lear, one of William Shakespeare’s greatest tragedies, explores this theme. The elderly King Lear decides to divide his kingdom among his three daughters. But he makes a fatal error when he tells his daughters that they must offer florid declarations of love in order to get the land.

The vile Goneril and Regan are effusive in their love and get part of the kingdom. But his beloved Cordelia, the only one who really loves Lear, refuses to be insincere and is disinherited. Lear learns quickly just how Goneril and Regan really feel about him when they go back on their promises to support him. Lear becomes mad as he wanders the land with his faithful Fool. And though he is reunited with Cordelia, it doesn’t end well.

This subject continues to be explored in literature, theater and feature films. In fact, there are three acclaimed films released this year that are all in awards consideration.

Netflix’s DICK JOHNSON IS DEAD is the unique, funny and poignant Sundance Award-winning documentary in which Kirsten Johnson attempts to cope with her sweet widowed father’s dementia by staging increasingly absurdist ways her father could die—body doubles did the stunts—and even stages a mock funeral so he can hear just how much people love him. Anthony Hopkins gives one of his most complex performances in the haunting film THE FATHER, which will be released this December, as a man descending down the rabbit hole of Alzheimer’s when his daughter (Olivia Colman) leaves him in a nursing home in London and moves to Paris to live with her new boyfriend.

And then there’s Sophia Loren’s powerful turn in Netflix’s Italian-language drama THE LIFE AHEAD. The still stunning 86-year-old actress, who won the Best Actress Oscar of 1961 for Vittorio De Sica’s harrowing TWO WOMEN, plays Madame Rosa, a former prostitute living in Naples who is haunted by memories of the Holocaust. Madame Rosa has created her own family as a foster mother to a trio of children born of prostitutes, as well as a loyal, caring group of friends. THE LIFE AHEAD was a family affair for Loren. Her youngest son, Edoardo Ponti, directed and co-wrote this adaptation of a 1975 Romain Gary novel. He said in a recent interview that when they collaborate on a project, “We want to show the world the best of Sophia.” And he did.

There’s a good chance you haven’t heard of one of the most admired films dealing with old age, Leo McCarey’s MAKE WAY FOR TOMORROW (’37). McCarey is best known for his zany Marx Brothers comedy DUCK SOUP (’33); THE AWFUL TRUTH (‘37), the hilarious screwball comedy for which he won the directing Oscar; the sentimental GOING MY WAY (‘44), which swept the Oscars; and the four-hankie weepie romance AN AFFAIR TO REMEMBER (‘57).

So, it’s hard to believe the same filmmaker made MAKE WAY FOR TOMORROW, a drama so powerful, well-acted and sad that it will stay with you forever. In fact, it may force you to look at the way you treat your ageing parents. Filmmakers such as Orson Welles once said of MAKE WAY FOR TOMORROW, “It would make a stone cry.” Jean Renoir, Ernst Lubitsch, Frank Capra, Delmer Daves and Bertrand Tavernier have championed the movie as well. And, it also inspired Yasujiro Ozu’s masterpiece TOKYO STORY (’53).

In a 2010 piece he wrote for Criterion, Tavernier recalled seeing the film for the first time. “The screening remains one of the most powerful moments of the decade for me,” he noted. “The nearly miraculous way in which McCarey manages to avoid the bathos inherent in such a subject, steering clear of sticky pity, of condescension and moralizing sermons – it all transfixed me. It was as though an arrow had struck me and stayed vibrating in my heart. I’ve experienced the same feeling every time I’ve seen the film in the 40 years since.”

Beulah Bondi and Victor Moore give the performances of their storied careers as a longtime married couple who lose their home to a bank foreclosure. Though they have five children, none of their offspring are willing to take them together. So, Bondi goes to live with her son (Thomas Mitchell) where she keeps driving her daughter-in-law (Fay Bainter) and teenage granddaughter (Barbara Read) crazy. Moore doesn’t have it any better moving in with his hard-nosed daughter and lazy son-in-law. The couple reunite for one day in New York City and those scenes are a gut-punch of emotion. And unlike most Hollywood films of the day, it doesn’t end happily for the couple.

Paramount pleaded with McCarey to change the ending to something more upbeat. He refused. Despite good reviews, the film bombed at the box office. Paramount dropped him from their roster. So, he signed with Harry Cohn at Columbia where he made THE AWFUL TRUTH, starring Cary Grant and Irene Dunne, which was nominated for six Oscars including Best Film, Best Actress and McCarey winning Best Director. But McCarey didn’t forget MAKE WAY FOR TOMORROW during his Oscar acceptance speech. He opened it by saying: “Thanks, but you gave it to me for the wrong picture.”