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Review #576 of 365
Movie Review of Awake (2007) [R] 78 minutes
WIP™ Scale: $13.00
Where Viewed: Harkins Ciné Capri at Northfield 18, Denver, CO
When 1st Seen: 30 November 2007
Time: 3:50 pm
DVD Release Date: Unscheduled (please check back)
Film's Official Website • Film's Trailer
Soundtrack: order the CD below
Directed by: Joby Harold (debut)
Screenplay by: Joby Harold (debut)
Featured Cast (Where You Might Remember Him/Her From):
Hayden Christensen (Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith) • Jessica Alba (Good Luck Chuck) • Terrence Howard (August Rush) • Lena Olin (Casanova) • Christopher McDonald (Kickin It Old Skool) • Sam Robards ("Gossip Girl") • Arliss Howard ("Medium") • Fisher Stevens (Slow Burn) • Georgina Chapman (The Nanny Diaries)
Click for 'Review Lite' [a 150-word or less review of this film]
Click to see photos from the Premiere of Awake
Click to read the spoiler points for Awake
Apparently nobody wanted to compete with Joby Harold's debut dramatic film Awake starring Jessica Alba and Hayden Christensen giving it a rare opportunity to open a weekend virtually alone in the category of major motion pictures opening on the weekend of 30 November 2007 uncontested. Such treatment is generally reserved for blockbuster films like
Transformers in the summertime; and, yet, here this compact, 78-minute film stands alone the weekend after Thanksgiving in the USA. Well, there's no accounting for the scheduling prognosticators who tinker away at the film release calendar to the point of driving any of us trying to post up a reasonably accurate listing nearly bonkers, and so it is that Awake is out there for everyone to see. Of course, someone is also probably hoping you'll rush to see any of the other major motion pictures out there that you may have missed due to the kicking in of good, old L-tryptophan in the turkey. In any case, it's a good thing that Awake is a pretty good little film given the auspiciousness of its release. [Theoretically, there might be some sarcasm intended toward the use of the word 'auspiciousness' because, actually, announcements of Awake's release date were relatively recent—meaning those of us maintaining a list really found out about this film quite late. There was no advance poster circulating the web for 9 months and there's still no trailer for the film available in the iTunes™ library which seems like kind of an uninformed move these days.] So, are you still awake? Ok, good. The film's story concerns a heart transplant. Young billionaire, Clay Beresford (Hayden Christensen) has a congenital heart problem and needs a new heart however, his O- blood type makes him a hard recipient to match up—or so the doctors in the film say. [Theoretically, the blood type of a person doesn't have much of anything to do with what type of organ recipient they will make, only what type of blood they can have transfused because only our red blood cells, not even our white blood cells have the protein markers on them that cause the blood to agglutinate when exposed to antibodies of an opposing blood stream such as putting type A blood into a type B person—this is generally not a good thing, fatal actually. But, these proteins due not appear on cardiac muscle cells of the heart nor any other organ cells of the body. But, Joby Harold needed there to be some reason why the young billionaire was having to wait so extra long for a heart for transplant, it seems he kind of made this part up; and, since the doctors in the film are not doctors, rather actors, probably they wouldn't know that this wasn't actually true either. Because, of course, we don't expect people in the USA to graduate from high school having taken and comprehended basic biology taught to them by a home economics teacher transferred to the science department because she took 1 credit of biology thirty-five years ago in junior college.] So, in the meantime, while Clay waits for a heart, he continues to have a secretive relationship with Sam Lockwood (Jessica Alba) his mother's administrative assistant. They both know that she wouldn't like their relationship, so they hide it for six months until she just cannot take it anymore and Sam begs him to tell his mother. But, it's his friend and savior, Dr. Jack Harper (Terrence Howard) who comes in to Clay's life when he has a heart attack, that convinces him to not only tell his mother but to tie the knot with Sam during an operating room lecture where he explains the realities of Clay's lifespan boiling it down to a 50-50 chance of surviving the heart transplant and then a probable life extension of an average of ten years. In other words, he's sort of already on borrowed time; and, if he loves her, he should show it immediately. So, the baby-faced tycoon saves Sam from a Manhattan thunderstorm and springs the news to his mother, Lilith (Lena Olin), who, of course, is none too pleased. She's upset about the lying, she's upset about the station of the girl, she's upset about losing her son—Mr. Beresford died one Christmas Eve taking a fatal tumble down the staircase in a Santa suit—who saw that coming? Despite her strenuous objections and threats of him walking out the door and making his choice, the two wed that very evening in a chapel arranged by Jack. And, lo and behold, the very next day, a heart is found. Clay won't hear of using his mother's preferred physician, Dr. Jonathan Neyer (Arliss Howard). Instead, he wants to go with Jack. Jack saved his life once, and he'll do it again, despite the four pending malpractice lawsuits against him.
When the operation is about to begin, though, a kink arises. Jack's usual anesthesiologist goes awol on the team of Harper, assisting surgeons Dr. Puttman (Fisher Stevens), and Dr. Carver (Georgina Chapman). Instead, Dr. Larry Lupin (Christopher McDonald) shows up in his place sent over from another hospital at the last moment and with a whisky flask in his scrub pocket and alcohol on his breath to match. This causes the team extraordinary consternation, but nothing like what it's about to cause Clay. For Clay, once injected with the cocktail that's designed to make him "see God", he doesn't go to sleep. Instead, he is completely aware, though unable to move, of everything that's going on. He panics and tries to focus on his memories of Sam to divert his attention from what's happening to him which eventually entails enduring the splitting of his rib cage to access his heart for transplant. But, that's not all. As he lies there, awake, he begins to learn unexpected things that will upend his understanding of the world to this point as he has known it. He'll manage to find a way to either actually project out of his body and run around the hospital and time seeking answers or he'll imagine it. Either way, his modest spirit adorns scrubs to prevent him from being seen gallivanting around in his birthday suit.Click to read the spoiler points if you just cannot wait to find out what he learns.
From the moment he's aware of what's going on, the pace and timbre of the film changes drastically. Before this, Clay Beresford seems like a young Prince William. Certain, confident, generous, upstanding, kind, and semi-unaware of those out in the world that might befriend him for the wrong reasons. At the moment, however, of his awakening, all that changes, and the dominoes begin to fall knocking down, one-by-one, every thing he's thought he's known about his life until this point. Hayden Christensen starts the play with strictly a vocal performance as an interior monologue.
"The essence of Christensen's performance captures incredible levels of emotional turbulence and desperation."
Achieving a riled up and frenetic state just vocally is a worthy achievement for a young actor. Then, however, when he leaps forth and must perform the rest of the film barefooted in his pale blue hospital scrubs running from place to place including down the center of a New York City subway station, his physical prowess takes on the urgency of a trained dancer as well. The essence of his performance captures incredible levels of emotional turbulence and desperation. You feel right along with him as the tragic consequences of his life unfold. Terrence Howard, whom, of late, seems on target to displace Maggie Gyllenhaal as the hardest working actor in Hollywood with five films released this year (
Pride,
The Hunting Party,
The Brave One,
August Rush, and now Awake) has the pivotal role of Dr. Harper. The character faces mind-bending complications that cause the actor to do some deep soul-searching—something Mr. Howard needs only deep, liquid eyes to accomplish. This guy can make you cry with just a deep glance, solemn face, and the beginning of tears welling up in his eyes. As for Jessica Alba's performance, unfortunately, just about anyone could play the role, and while her attractive qualities made the character precisely believable on the one hand, it also detracted somewhat on the other. The character of Sam Lockwood, unfortunately, lacked the depth of development of Clay and Jack's affording less insight into what makes her tick. Lena Olin, meanwhile, as the Beresford matriarch who raised Jack single-handedly since the death of her husband and managed to board room with an iron fist until Jack was finished with university and ready to take over, plays the role cautiously and with a bit too much of an overly protective mother edge. Her character will, ultimately, make one of the biggest sacrifices in the story; and she's not completely convincing in her ability to make us believe this is the choice her character would make. The ending tries to account for this a little balancing her wit with her love for her son, but given that she plays the mother as being so cold for most of the film, her decisions in the end seem just a tad out of her range.
Joby Harold scores some points with his direction and screen play for keeping this taut thriller moving. There's barely a moment in this shorter film that's not propelling the story forward toward the shocking revelations, twists, and turns. The drawback, most notably in the structure and the ending, is that the most important thing everyone would want to know in the end would be the ultimate impact these events would have on Clay's life, and this we never find out.
"… a set-up with resolution but without conclusion…makes the film less powerful and effective in the end. span>
It's partly a product of the structure, and partly probably a decision to end and leave it up to audience speculation. In effect, though, this becomes a set-up with resolution but without conclusion and makes the film less powerful and effective in the end.
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Cast Members
Hayden Christensen • Jessica Alba • Terrence Howard
Lena Olin • Christopher McDonald • Sam Robards
Arliss Howard • Fisher Stevens • Georgina Chapman
Director
Joby Harold
Writer
Joby Harold
Review-lite
Awake (2007) [max of 150 words]
In just 78 minutes, writer / director Joby Harold takes us to the edge of our seat as tycoon titan billionaire Clay Beresford (Hayden Christensen) faces a heart transplant while awake. And during his 'awakening' he will learn and be forced to reckon with a series of unexpected revelations that literally upend his world as he knows it. All of this on the day after his maternally disapproved marriage to his mother's assistant, Sam Lockwood (Jessica Alba). Meanwhile, his physician, Dr. Jack Harper (Terrence Howard), too will have to contemplate the choices of his own life as he wrests the beating heart from his friend preparing to replace it with a new one. Unfortunately, though, the film is a set-up with resolution but without conclusion making it less powerful and effective in the end.
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1 comment:
Scooter,
Interesting review of the movie and Jessica Alba.
I wonder if the case is going to be the same in The Eye.
Cat
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