Monday, October 6, 2014

Awakenings (Movie Review by Bob Racine)



                                           2 hrs, color, 1990

The recent death of Robin Williams has naturally triggered memories of  outstanding performances he has given on the wide screen, and while I recall moments of great hilarity he has created, ones I hope to view again and enjoy again, and in a style that no one has been able to ape, we must not forget that he has made dramatic contributions that are just as native to his genius as the comic ones.  Likewise they too are endemic to his special talent; no one else could have pulled them off exactly as he did.  Perhaps the most low keyed of all is the portrayal of Dr. Malcolm Sayer, a neurologist who conducted an amazing experiment at a chronic hospital in the Bronx in the summer of 1969 that became known worldwide. 

Sayer, as Williams portrays him, is a very quiet, retiring and humble man who in his quiet, retiring and humble manner implores his staff to allow him the administering of a new drug to a few dozen victims of a largely paralyzing disease, whose symptoms he traces to encephalitis.  Encouraged and supported by a nursing assistant named Eleanor (Julie Kavner) he believes heartily that his patients are not brain dead as he has been informed by his superiors but “alive on the inside,” and he manages to press his case to get miraculous results.   He demonstrates what we might call deferential, self-effacing persistence.  Although cast alongside a more boisterous player during the course of the film, Williams generates a magnetic field that brought forth rare inner qualities for which he had not been noted up to that point – the year of release being 1990.          

That other actor is none other than Robert Deniro giving one of his most powerful and remarkable portrayals as Leonard Lowe, a man who has resided in that hospital for over thirty years unable to move his limbs or to speak or to eat or even to turn his head without assistance, one of the group under Sayer’s care who display varied manifestations of this immobility.  Some can shuffle around the floor; all of them can catch a ball if it is tossed at them but without bending an arm or leg.  Frankly as a group they strike a rather hideous pose.  Using Leonard for a successful trial run, Sayer amazes everyone including himself when soon he has them all awakening from a years-long catatonia, speaking and walking and discovering the world anew. 

Suddenly for these resurrected individuals it is the little things that take on gigantic importance.  Leonard awakes at nighttime and cannot understand where everybody on the ward has gone and why the place is so quiet, when he is wide awake.  He has some difficulty distinguishing day from night and is afraid to go to sleep after the following day passes.  Sayer has to assure him that he will not stay asleep as before but will wake up when it is morning again and that that will be another day.  He is curious about his grownup image in the mirror, the first reflection of himself he has seen since he was nine years old.  He learns how to eat corn on the cob, how to shave for the first time, how to dress himself, how to comb his hair that has grown to never before seen lengths and is mind blown by the sight of street scenes through which he is escorted – mobs of people milling around in unfamiliar dress.  He discovers rock and roll and goes into a frenzy like that of a child when he is allowed to wade into the water at the shore.

Sayer is frightened, wondering what kind of strange Pandora’s Box he has opened.  His most overwhelming moment and the audience’s most hilarious moment consists of a visit he and his patients make to a dance floor, where a swing orchestra is playing music that was popular when many of the patients were younger and healthy, before their affliction came about.  Suddenly he has a lot of turned on, swinging and swaying and jitterbugging folk, one of whom pulls him against his will onto the floor kicking up his heels – this staid, private, almost antisocial man who has a devil of a time keeping up with everyone.  I laughed myself silly during both of my screenings.  A most touching and sweet diversion is delivered by a woman named Lucy (Alice Drummond), who rediscovers the voice she once had, singing “Just a Song at Twilight.” 

But of course the effect of the drug is not permanent, and Leonard, who starts taking it some time before the rest of them do, is the first to manifest retrograde symptoms, and here is where the full throttle skill of Deniro’s acting kicks in.  I doubt if a majority of even the most professional players could master the tics and shakes and shudders and spasms and seizures that he has to simulate.  We can only dimly imagine the hours and days and maybe even weeks he had to spend mastering them before confronting the camera. 

Contrast has always been an essential aspect of any work of art in any medium, and the two male stars of “Awakenings” provide a most potent manifestation of it.  You have Deniro rattling the rafters, tearing up the scenery, openly volcanic alongside Williams playing it cool, soft and poised.  Both are fine tuned, exactly what they are supposed to be and they make a spellbinding combination.  Williams, though he may seem upstaged in the familiar sense of the term, is just as vital to the drama and is just as adroit in the use of body language and visible emotion as his costar.  Having been an actor myself who has played both types, I can truthfully attest to this state of play.  The softer portrayal can appear to be the easier, but if done with earnest it can be the most demanding of the two.  There are many examples of this phenomenon in cinema history.  Richard Burton seems for a spell a mere straight man in “Becket” to Peter O’Toole’s complex, conflicted Henry II, but he is anything but that.  Jack Lemmon seemed a wearisome Mr. Uptight next to Walter Matthau in “The Odd Couple,” but his is actually the most demanding of the two roles, a fact that becomes clear upon close, careful inspection.  Bette Davis is a ghastly scourge of horror in “Whatever Happened to Baby Jane,” while Joan Crawford, the victim of her abuse, who barely moves a muscle, is a quiet force to contend with from her wheelchair, but just as essential to the conflict. 

Williams could have merely walked through the part, but his work here is a study in the brilliant use of subtlety to unearth the soul and psyche of a subject.  There is more to what he does than at first meets the eye.

And it is Sayer who gets in the last word of reflection, when he is talking to his fellow physicians assembled.  In trying to make sense of what the experiment has meant to posterity, despite its disappointing outcome, Sayer declares that the awakenings could not have come about if not for the adamant will of the patients themselves.  “The human spirit is more powerful than any drug.”  So it is!

The screenplay by Steven Zaillian (to gain acclaim for his writing on “Schindler’s List” just a few years later) is based upon a book by Oliver Sacks, M.D., and the picture was directed by Penny Marshall with a knowing, sensitive approach and a skillful hand.  As I announced when I opened up this blog, I will be taking a look at old movies from time to time, especially those like this one that have not dated and are eternally new.


To read other entries in my blog, please consult its website:  enspiritus.blogspot.com.  To learn about me consult on the website the blog entry for August 9, 2013.

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