Awakenings, 1990.
Directed by Penny Marshall.
Starring Robert De Niro, Robin Williams, John Heard, Julie Kavner, Penelope Ann Miller, and Max von Sydow.
SYNOPSIS:
Penny Marshall’s minor classic Awakenings, a box office success with a trio of Oscar nominations, arrives on 4K Ultra HD with a solid restoration. The bonus features are scant and don’t include anything new, unfortunately, but this one is still a worthwhile purchase for fans of Marshall and this stellar cast.
I don’t know if I’ll ever get over the general sadness I feel whenever I think about Robin Williams. Dying at the age of 63 feels so wrong for someone like him, who should have gotten the chance to keep acting well into his old age, assuming he would have wanted to do so.
The 1990 film Awakenings is a great example of just how wonderful he could be. As a kid of the 70s, I watched him evolve from the goofy humor of his stand-up routines and the Mork from Ork to roles like teacher John Keating in Dead Poets Society, Henry Sagan in The Fisher King, and the one in this film: Dr. Malcom Sayer.
Based on a true story, Awakenings first introduces us to Leonard Lowe, a young boy who falls into a catatonic state and remains that way into his adult years, when he’s played by Robert De Niro. Leonard lives in a hospital ward with other patients like him, and Dr. Sayer, despite his awkardness around people and desire to focus more on research, realizes there could be a way to “wake them up.”
His fellow doctors ridicule his ideas, but he quickly proves them wrong, as his trial-and-error process results in Leonard emerging from his catatonic state and interacting with the people and environment around him. Soon Malcolm is able to rouse the other patients from their encephalitis lethargica-induced slumber, and the ward comes alive.
Of course, the question of how to handle these patients soon arises, and the hospital administrators are wary of giving them too much freedom. What if they allow one of the patients, such as Leonard, to wander the city unsupervised and something awful happens to him? Are they responsible for such an outcome?
Leonard chafes against such restrictions, and when he strikes up a friendship with Paula (Penelope Ann Miller), whose father is another patient in a similar catatonic state, he decides to forcefully push back on the powers that be. That doesn’t go well for him, and Malcolm must wrestle with how to handle a volatile situation he has created.
Awakenings was a box office success and earned three Oscar nominations, so its arrival on 4K Ultra HD makes a lot of sense. No Blu-ray is included here, but you do get a code for a digital copy. Sony conducted a restoration of the film that’s top-notch, with a presentation that’s reminiscent of its original theatrical experience. Sure, none of us can say for sure this is what the movie looked like in theaters in 1990, but I’m sure this disc’s picture quality is about as close as you can get.
On the bonus features front, the studio unfortunately didn’t commission anything new, so we just get the theatrical trailer, a six-minute making of featurette (with the imaginative name Making-Of Featurette), and nearly nine minutes of archival interviews with the cast and crew. That last one offers a bittersweet glimpse into the careers of people who were operating at the peak of their abilities, so I’m glad we at least have that going for us.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★ ★
Brad Cook
