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Ghost Town features British comedian and writer Ricky Gervais in his first leading man role. He plays Bertram Pincus, a man who, after dying briefly during a routine operation, can now see the dead people who fill New York. So kind of a cross between Ghost and The Sixth Sense – two of my favorite films.

I’m not planning to review the film – apart from to say that I really loved it – what I actually wanted to do was talk about the main theme: grief. Yes, in a romantic comedy. And it is very funny, but it also made me sob.

Once the ghosts realise Pincus can see them, they won’t leave him alone. They all feel that they are still around because they have “unfinished business” and they want him to help them get to the other side.

It’s a common idea, this one of ghosts lingering because of unfinished business, but I hope it’s not too much of a spoiler to say that Pincus comes to the realisation that it’s not the dead who have the unfinished business, but the living who need to let them go.

This resonated with me strongly. My mum died nine years ago and, despite the fact that her death had been the worst thing I could ever imagine happening to me, once she was gone I was furious. With her. So I dealt with it the only way I know how – I wrote about it.

I wrote how much I loved her and missed her, but I also wrote “it pisses me off so much that you weren’t open about your dying and that you didn’t let me come and see you. My friends say I have to respect that, but I think it was selfish and cowardly. And I feel guilty that I didn’t demand to see you. You were my mum and my best friend and I should have had a chance to say goodbye, to tell you that I loved you and I resent that you took that away from me.”

Even nine years later, I still have the anger and the guilt. I know I need to let it go, but I’m not sure how. It informs all parts of my life, because so much of my life is influenced by my upbringing and my relationship with my parents, my mum in particular. How I feel about money mainly comes from my mum. My issues with body image come from my mum. I think it would help me to talk to her about it, but of course I can’t.

I would never have thought a Ricky Gervais romantic comedy would bring these feelings to the surface, but it did. And I’m glad.