Slate's Geezer Issue One Year Later: Best Friends Forever

This article from Slate's Geezer issue from last year discusses the movie subgenre that columnist Jessica Winter aptly labels "old-buddy movies." The piece describes a myriad of different movies of this variety, from the original Odd Couple (starring Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau) to Clint Eastwood's Space Cowboys. Ironically, while Winter warns against any tone of condescension in these movies' humor, she herself has a condescending attitude towards the whole genre in general. Lumping virtually all of these movies together she writes, "One way to succeed [in making an old-buddy movie] is to make sure your grumpy old men spend ample time and energy resisting the very premise of the movie they're in." However, while her generalizations about elderly best friends are rather biting at times, she at least gives credit where credit is do (to Lemmon and Matthau's acting prowess, for instance). Personally, this article made me think about why society loves the old-buddy movie (as evidenced by the box office success of The Bucket List, for instance). Does society think this is the role of older people--to have fun with friends, reminisce about the past, and occasionally try to relive their glory days? And if society does think this, is that a good or bad thing?